Extracting business value from all three phases of the customer experience

Extracting Business Value
From All Three Phases of
the Customer Experience
Why messaging connectivity and
continuity is the recipe for success.

“Customer experience is not restricted
just to the attract-engage-convert-close
funnel. Rather it is about the lifetime
experience the buyer expects to have
with a vendor.”

– Forbes magazine

Extracting Business Value From All Three Phases of the Customer Experience 3
CEOs, CMOs and other business executives are quickly coming to the
realization that every aspect of the organization must work together
to achieve lasting customer experience success. It’s not just about
successful lead generation. It’s not just about great sales conversion
rates, or a better than average Net Promoter Score. Christine
Crandell, a contributing editor with Forbes magazine said it best:
“Customer experience is not restricted just to the attract-engage-
convert-close funnel. Rather it is about the lifetime experience the
buyer expects to have with a vendor.” What this means is every
phase of the customer experience matters. And only when all three
phases of the customer experience are performing at a high level
can a company reach its full potential.

The three phases of the customer experience
that matter are: self-service, sales process and
post-purchase.
And there is one aspect of your business that connects
and directly impacts every phase of the customer
experience. It’s your corporate story. More specifically, the
words that prospects and customers encounter throughout
the journey with your company. From a prospect’s first
encounter with your website, to the conversations they
have with your sales team, to the connections they have
with your customer support team — and everywhere in
between — your story is omnipresent.
The question is, just how consistent is
that story?
The truth is, the story most prospects and customers
consume throughout their journey is fragmented and
inconsistent, which negatively impacts business
performance. How? Because an inconsistent story creates
customer confusion, uncertainty, doubt, and negatively
impacts loyalty and trust. And we all know the foundation
of any lasting, profitable customer relationship is trust.
There is a direct correlation between the
consistency of your story and the degree
of trust you earn throughout the
customer experience.
Lack of consistency results in lower trust for the very
reasons we just stated. And, lack of trust results in lower
customer acquisition, retention and advocacy rates,
which are the metrics that directly impact the financial
performance of your business. Trust is critically important
— so much so that we should look at its definition:
Trust: a firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or
strength of someone or something.
Think about it, consistently communicating who you are,
what you do, the value you deliver and what you stand for
is critical when it comes to establishing trust between
your company and your customers. And yet, the corporate
story most prospects and customers experience in their
journey is far from consistent. We have identified three
primary barriers that prevent companies from delivering
a clear, compelling and consistent story throughout the
customer experience. These barriers are:
> Distributed ownership
> Functional silos
> Multichannel integration
“Improving customer
satisfaction can be an engine
of profitable growth, but it
demands a common vision
and new levels of coordination
across historically strong
organizational silos.
Establishing cross-functional,
multichannel customer
experiences should be a CEO
and board-level priority.”
– McKinsey & Company

These barriers create a highly disjointed
customer experience and prevent organizations
from delivering a clear, connected story.
They negatively impact business results and customer
satisfaction. That’s why breaking down these three
barriers should be a strategic priority for every CEO,
CMO and customer experience professional. McKinsey &
Company recently published a report that said, “Improving
customer satisfaction can be an engine of profitable
growth, but it demands a common vision and new levels
of coordination across historically strong organizational
silos. Establishing cross-functional, multichannel
customer experiences should be a CEO and
board-level priority.”
The key message from McKinsey is the critical importance
of “establishing cross-functional, multichannel customer
experiences.” The only way to make this happen is to
eliminate these barriers and deliver a consistent story
throughout all three phases of the customer experience:
> Self-Service Phase
> Sales Phase
> Post-Purchase Phase
This paper will explore how you establish continuity
and connectivity in your corporate story throughout the
customer experience by breaking down the barriers to
success: distributed ownership, functional silos and
multichannel integration.
5Extracting Business Value From All Three Phases of the Customer Experience

“Today, customers have
unprecedented access to your
company. Their experience spans
more people, processes and
technologies than ever before.”

The Big Picture
Before we explore each phase of the customer experience,
let’s look at some of the changes CEOs and CMOs must
contend with in the experience economy. Today, customers
have unprecedented access to your company. Their
experience spans more people, processes and technologies
than ever before. This has resulted in an explosion in
the number of ways they interact with your business.
The greatest impact from this explosion has been felt in
three key areas: organizational structure, communication
channels and partner ecosystem.
Organizational structure:
There are more individuals and teams that have
customer-facing communication ownership and
responsibility within the enterprise than ever before. Think
about all the customer-facing areas of your business
and the interactions they have directly or indirectly (via
technology) with your customers. Every one of these
interactions has an impact on the customer experience.
Communication channels:
Never before have there been more channels through
which companies communicate with customers and
through which customers communicate with companies.
From websites to social channels, customer portals, online
chat and email, the list goes on and on. Each of these
channels plays a different role at different times in the
Partner ecosystem:
Technology has had a dramatic impact on the number of
sales and marketing partners companies must manage.
A few years ago, a single advertising agency may have
handled the majority of how, when and where the company
story was told in the marketplace. Today, companies have
dozens of partners developing and delivering messages at
distinct points in the customer experience.
The changes become even more difficult to contend
with when you layer on the barriers we mentioned
earlier: distributed ownership, functional silos and
multi channel integration.
All of these changes, combined with barriers that have
been formed over time, have had a tremendous impact on
how companies develop and deliver their story. This leads
us back to the challenge companies face in delivering
a consistent story throughout all three phases of the
Distributed ownership:
The number of individuals, teams, partners
that are responsible for developing and / or
delivering the corporate story throughout the
customer experience has
dramatically increased.
Functional silos:
The independent functions / roles within
departments, business units, divisions and
partner ecosystem that communicate with
customers has grown significantly.
Multichannel integration:
The shear number of channels and
communication vehicles used to communicate
and interact with customers has exploded.

8
Visualization exercise.
Take a moment to visualize a customer-facing picture of your organizational structure, communication channels and
partner ecosystem. Look at each of these through the lens of how your corporate story is developed and delivered
throughout the customer experience. Which areas of the organization interact with the customer? How many
communication channels are being utilized? Which partners are involved in specific aspects of the
customer journey?
Now overlay that picture with each of the barriers that have been identified:
Messaging Development
and Delivery
> Functional silos
Organizational
Structure
Communication
Channels
Partner
Ecosystem
> Functional silos
> Functional silos

Next, take that picture and isolate each phase of the customer experience by independently looking at your
organizational structure, communication channels, partner ecosystem and barriers through the self-service,
sales and post-purchase phases of the customer experience:
Self-Service
> Functional silos
Organizational
Structure
Communication
Channels
Partner
Ecosystem
> Functional silos
> Functional silos
Sales Process
> Functional silos
Organizational
Structure
Communication
Channels
Partner
Ecosystem
> Functional silos
> Functional silos
Post-Purchase
> Functional silos
Organizational
Structure
Communication
Channels
Partner
Ecosystem
> Functional silos
> Functional silos

You should have a clear picture as to why the
story your customer consumes throughout their
journey is highly fragmented and inconsistent.
The answer: Complexity
Complexity that has multiplied as the customer journey
has grown more sophisticated over time. By now, you
should be seeing:
> Highly distributed ownership of messaging
development and delivery internally and externally.
Functional silos across the business that interact with
customers on a consistent basis.
Limited connectivity between a wide range of
communication channels used in each phase of the
No wonder most companies are unable to deliver a
consistent message that fosters trust. It should come as
no surprise that organizations find it difficult to create
clarity in the minds of their customers with respect to the
company’s purpose, vision, mission, value proposition and
promise. And it should not be a mystery as to why most
companies can’t seem to leverage their corporate story as
a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
The good news is CEOs and CMOs that deal with reality
and break down the barriers preventing the company
from delivering a consistent story will win. They will win
because they will tell a consistent story throughout the
customer experience that establishes “a firm belief in
the reliability, truth, ability, or strength” of their company
in the mind of their customer, which as we know, is the
definition of trust.
Those who don’t can make all the other operational,
technology and process changes they think will impact
the customer experience. But, in the end, their story
will be disjointed and customers will still walk away from
their experience with “a feeling of uncertainty or lack of
conviction.” And, that’s the definition of doubt.

Creating certainty and conviction in the minds
of your customers.
To extract business value from all three phases of the
customer experience, companies must address these
barriers and the enterprise-wide messaging development
and delivery problem. The CEO, CMO and customer
experience leaders must get in a room and devise a plan
for delivering a consistent story in the complex experience
economy they operate in today.
This starts with the CEO making the corporate story a
strategic priority across the organization. The CEO must
fundamentally buy in to the fact that your corporate story
directly impacts the customer experience and financial
performance. With this buy-in secured, the CEO and CMO
must then agree on what the story actually is. To develop
a compelling and authentic message, the corporate story
should be rooted in the company’s go-to-market strategy,
competitive intelligence and insights gained from voices
that matter.
It should be no surprise that
organizations find it difficult to
create clarity in the minds of
their customers with respect to
the company’s purpose, vision,
mission, value proposition
and promise.

These voices include prospects, customers, employees and
partners. Then the CMO must invest the time and energy
to build a holistic Corporate Messaging Platform that
will serve as the foundation for customer communication
across the enterprise. This Platform must include specific,
intentional words and phrases that tell the complete
corporate story. A story that captures the essence of
the company’s:
Purpose
Vision
Mission
Values
Positioning statement
Who we are
What we do
The value we deliver
Promise to customers
What makes us different in the market
With strategically aligned corporate messaging in place,
the CMO must then work with customer experience
professionals and functional leaders across the entire
business to activate the story. The goal is to drive deep
understanding and buy-in of the story and ensure
processes are in place to activate consistent messages
across critical channels and touchpoints throughout all
three phases of the customer experience.
You might be saying to yourself, “yeah, we already do
that” or “that sounds easy.” Stop right there and remind
yourself of the picture you painted just a few minutes ago:
The picture that looked at messaging development
and delivery through the lens of the self-service,
sales process and post-purchase phases of the
The picture that captured areas of the organization,
communication channels and the partner ecosystem
involved in each phase of the customer experience.
The picture that identified distributed ownership,
functional silos and multichannel integration barriers
within each phase.
Now ask yourself, “Do I really have the disciplined,
enterprise-wide messaging development and delivery
processes required to tell a consistent story throughout
the customer experience?”

If you are honest with yourself, the answer is probably no.
And that’s OK. Most companies don’t apply the discipline,
time or resources required to truly break down these
barriers and put intentional processes in place to ensure
that a consistent story is told throughout the customer
experience. However, companies that do address these
barriers and deliver a consistent story reap significant
rewards. A recent McKinsey study revealed the number
one trait of companies that succeed in delivering a
superior customer experience is the ability to develop
and deliver a clear, consistent corporate message.
That’s why companies that want to establish competitive
differentiation based on customer experience must deliver
a consistent story.
The CEO must fundamentally
buy in to the fact that your
corporate story directly impacts
the customer experience and
financial performance.

CMOs must work with customer
experience professionals and functional
leaders across the entire business to
activate a consistent story.

Understanding Each Phase
of the Customer Experience
To address these challenges, you must first understand
each phase of the customer experience in greater detail
and the independent yet interconnected role they play in
the journey.
Self-Service Phase
This is the phase of the customer experience that is
increasing in importance every day. The self-service phase
is where prospects and customers are engaging with
your corporate story independently without any human
interaction from your organization. This is where they are
learning more about your company, people, products and
services predominantly online, consuming content and
messages through a wide range of digital channels. The
self-service phase of the customer experience is critical
to the buying and repeat-buying experience. In fact,
according to research conducted by Kapost, a content
management software company, “75% of the B2B buying
process now takes place online and more than 60% of
decision makers start this buying journey with informal
research, using search engines and business blogs to
research products, problems, and solutions.”
To reap the greatest value in this phase of the customer
experience, you must cultivate engagement and trust,
which is done by ensuring that a clear, compelling and
consistent message is delivered across critical channels
and touchpoints throughout the self-service journey. To
make this happen, you must dissect and address the
barriers that stand in the way. In this paper, we will
provide you with a worksheet that will guide you through
that process.

Sales Phase
The buying journey is a critical aspect of the customer
experience and consists of two distinct, yet highly
connected processes: self-service and sales. The self-
service phase, as we have discussed, takes place when
prospects conduct independent research and consume
your corporate messaging and content without contacting
anyone at your organization. This is the stage when they
evaluate if they want to engage in more detailed sales
conversations. If they like your story, content and point of
view, they will engage with a sales person. Your goal in
the sales phase is to ensure sales professionals are well
positioned to connect with, extend and add to the story
consumed during the self-service phase.
“60% of decision makers
start this buying journey with
informal research, using
search engines and business
blogs to research products,
problems, and solutions.”
– Kapost
“75% of the B2B buying process
now takes place online.”
– Kapost

However, if marketing and sales are not working from
the same sheet of music, the self-service and sales
experience can break down because of inconsistent
and disjointed messaging. That’s why it’s imperative
that marketing and sales are working from a common
Corporate Messaging Platform, and why sales enablement
tools and selling conversations must be infused with
strategic messages from this shared platform.
Companies that connect the self-service and sales phase
of the customer experience with a clear, compelling and
consistent corporate message spark meaningful and
trusted connections and conversations with customers.
However, to ensure that messaging continuity and
consistency take root, you must first clearly understand
exactly which areas of the organization, communication
channels and sales / marketing partners are involved
in the sales process. With this knowledge in hand, you
can devise a plan for ensuring the Corporate Messaging
Platform is activated across critical sales tools,
conversations and communication vehicles utilized
throughout this phase of the journey.
Post-Purchase Phase
Some might say that there really isn’t a post-purchase
phase of the customer experience because customers are
always making buying decisions, deciding to purchase
more, less or not at all. This is true. However, as it
relates to delivering a consistent story throughout the
customer experience, it is important to isolate this critical
phase. Why? Because it plays a significant role in initial
purchase, repeat purchase, customer retention and loyalty.
In fact, according to research conducted by New Business
Strategies, “60 percent of Fortune 500 companies say
their purchase decision is based on what the buyer
believes their post-purchase experience will be like.”
Another reason the post-purchase phase must be isolated
and assessed is that much like the self-service and sales
process, customers engage with different areas of the
organization, communication channels and partners after
they have made a purchase. Many executives default
ownership and accountability for the post-purchase phase
of the customer experience to the customer service or
support department. Needless to say, this is a blatant
oversimplification. The truth is, almost every aspect of
the business plays a role in the post-purchase experience.
Sales, sales support, product management, marketing,
public relations, account management, professional
services, and ordering / fulfillment, just to name a few.
The truth is, CMOs and customer experience executives
must get more involved in shaping the post-purchase
experience. After all, this is the phase of the customer
experience where the promises and messages the
company has communicated during the self-service
and sales process must actually be fulfilled.
Companies that connect the
self-service and sales phase
of the customer experience
with a clear, compelling and
consistent corporate message
spark meaningful and trusted
connections and conversations
with customers.

CMOs and customer experience
executives must get more involved in
shaping the post-purchase experience.
After all, this is the phase of the
customer experience where the promises
and messages the company has
communicated during the self-service
and sales process must actually
be fulfilled.

Auditing and addressing barriers in each phase of the
Now that you have a clear understanding of the importance and role
each phase plays in the customer experience, it’s time to dig in and
determine how you can create greater connectivity and consistency
in your corporate story throughout all three. This worksheet will
help get you started. The questions will help you audit and assess
your organizational structure, communication channels and partner
ecosystem. They will also help you identify the distributed ownership,
functional silos and multichannel integration barriers that
may exist.

Strategic Questions Self-Service Sales Process Post-Purchase
Which areas of the organization
play a role in this phase of the
customer experience?
Which functional silos exist within each
of these areas of our organization?
What changes are required to establish
greater messaging continuity between
these functional areas (process,
technology integration, training)?
Who are the leaders responsible for
each of these functional areas?
Which communication channels,
vehicles and touchpoints are used to
interact with customers?
Which sales and marketing partners
play a role in this phase of the
customer experience?
Which communication channels,
vehicles and touchpoints do each of
these partners manage?
Where do we need to establish
greater multichannel connectivity and
integration to deliver a consistent story?

CEOs and CMOs who work together
and make it a priority to connect
the corporate story throughout
the customer experience will reap
significant rewards.

Value Creation is Achieved
Through a Connected
Process and Platform
To extract optimal results and value from each phase of
the customer experience you need two things:
Process: a connected enterprise-wide messaging
development and delivery strategy.
Platform: a comprehensive Corporate Messaging
Platform that drives consistent storytelling.
With the answers and findings from your worksheet, you
can begin formulating a plan that will help you deliver a
clear, compelling and consistent message. But without
a Corporate Messaging Platform in place, there will be
nothing to drive consistency and continuity throughout
each phase of the customer experience. Organizational
and functional leaders will have nothing to anchor their
story to. There won’t be a go-to source of consistent
messaging that can be woven into critical communication
channels, vehicles and touchpoints. The secret to success
is combining process with platform to drive a consistent
corporate story throughout the self-service, sales and
post-purchase phases of the customer experience.
CEOs, CMOs and customer experience professionals
who work together and make it a priority to connect the
corporate story throughout the customer experience
will reap significant rewards. They will generate lasting
business results by increasing customer trust, brand
preference, retention, loyalty — and ultimately share of
wallet. A recent study conducted by The CMO Club and
IBM said, “... marketers have recognized the need and are
beginning to shift priorities toward retention and loyalty
and driving customer advocacy across each interaction
point, from discover and learn to use and advocate.”
Table stakes for achieving advocacy is acknowledging
that customers expect and even demand connectivity,
continuity and consistency throughout their journey.
A great place for CEOs and CMOs to start is with the
corporate story. After all, it’s the one thing that is
omnipresent and has a material impact on all three
phases of the customer experience.
Without a Corporate
Messaging Platform in
place, there will be nothing
to drive consistency and
continuity throughout
each phase of the

About OnMessage
Companies that succeed in maintaining complete
alignment between their corporate story and strategy
— win. They win because their words and actions are
consistent; creating a superior experience that increases
customer acquisition, retention, loyalty and competitive
differentiation. OnMessage specializes in helping
executives align and activate their entire organization
around a corporate strategy and story that dramatically
improves the customer experience. Leveraging our
disciplined methodology — executive teams are able
to crystallize their go-to-market strategy, formulate a
strategically aligned corporate messaging platform and
ensure every stakeholder understands how to activate the
strategy and story throughout the customer journey. In
addition, our cloud-based intelligence console provides
leaders with timely and accurate insights. Market,
customer, employee, culture, competitor and partner
insights they need to optimize their strategy, story and
customer experience overtime. We are OnMessage, the
strategy consulting firm helping executives win in the
highly competitive “experience economy” that exists today.
© Copyright OnMessage, Inc. 2016 | All rights reserved.
For more information
For more valuable and informative resources that can
help you improve your customer’s experience, go to:
itsonmessage.com/resource
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itsonmessage.com
James O’Gara
President and Founder
James O’Gara is the president and founder of OnMessage.
Under his leadership, OnMessage has developed a proven
model for helping companies develop a clear, compelling
and consistent message. With almost 25 years’ experience
working in business and marketing leadership positions,
O’Gara is known and respected for building collaborative
relationships with executive teams that result in highly
effective go-to-market, messaging / positioning and
demand generation strategies.

Extracting business value from all three phases of the customer experience

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Extracting business value from all three phases of the customer experience