B2B Customer Engagement Strategy: An Introduction to Managing Customer Experience

✍ Scribed by Daniel D. Prior

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 233
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Business to business (B2B) transactions account for 60-70% of all transactions globally. Considering this, many supplier firms aspire to create high levels of customer engagement, and this involves identifying various ways to improve customer experience. In fact, companies such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and others now employ professionals in customer engagement roles and dedicate entire corporate divisions to ensure seamless customer engagement. 

Creating high customer engagement is challenging without a cohesive, strategic approach – particularly in B2B markets. This textbook introduces students to customer engagement strategy in B2B markets, the foundation of which is customer engagement capability. Companies must develop and implement four sub-capabilities – customer journey management, customer relationship management, customer communications and data analytics and insight to succeed. 

With a myriad of case studies, discussion questions and prompts for further reading, the textbook translates theory into practice and serves as a useful foundation for executive courses as well as fundamental reading for masters-level specialist courses in customer engagement, marketing, sales, and strategy. In addition, practitioners in supplier firms will also be able to use to  build their customer engagement capability. 

✦ Table of Contents

Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
About the Author
1: What Is Customer Engagement?
1 Introduction
2 Defining Customer Engagement
2.1 A Definition
3 Key Attributes of CE
3.1 CE Centres on a Brand
3.2 CE is a Psychological State
3.3 CE is an Emotional State
3.4 CE is Observable in Customer Behaviour
3.5 A Summary of CE Key Attributes
4 Why CE Matters
4.1 The Customer’s Perspective
4.2 The Supplier’s Perspective
4.3 The Impact on Society
5 Getting CE ‘Right’ for Suppliers
6 Towards CE Strategy
6.1 CE Strategy Involves a Long-Term Orientation
6.2 CE Strategy Involves the Development of Capabilities
6.3 CE Strategy Focuses on the Most Desirable Customers
6.4 CE Strategy Manipulates CE Forms
7 Chapter Summary
References
Further Reading
For an Overview of Research in CE, See:
2: CE Context
1 Introduction
2 What Is CE Context?
2.1 The Properties of CE Contexts
2.1.1 Timing
2.1.2 Place
2.1.3 The Nature of the Product/Service
2.1.4 Familiar Versus Unfamiliar
2.1.5 Independent Versus Social
2.1.6 A Summary of CE Contexts
3 The Purchase Situation
4 Focusing on Business-to-Business (B2B) CE Contexts
4.1 Differences Between B2B and B2C CE Contexts
4.2 Similarities Between B2B and B2C CE Contexts
5 B2B CE Contexts and Organisational Buying
6 Chapter Summary
References
3: Customer Experience (CX) and Customer Journey
1 Introduction
2 CX
2.1 The Emergence of CX
2.2 Components of CX
2.2.1 Customer Perceptions and Expectations
2.2.2 Customer Behaviour
2.2.3 Relating Customer Expectations, Perceptions, and Behaviours
3 Customer Journey
3.1 Customer Journey as a Linear Process
3.2 Customer Journey as a Reflexive Process
3.3 Customer Journey as Both Linear and Reflexive
4 B2B CX and Customer Journey
5 Chapter Summary
References
4: The Case for CE Capability
1 Introduction
2 Why We Need CE Capability
3 Defining CE Capabilities
3.1 CE Ordinary Capabilities
3.2 CE Dynamic Capabilities
4 Four Main CE Sub-capabilities
4.1 Customer Journey Management
4.2 Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
4.3 Customer Communications
4.4 Customer Analytics and Insight
5 A Holistic CE Capabilities and Sub-capabilities Framework
6 Chapter Summary
References
5: Customer Journey Management
1 Introduction
2 Customer Journey and Brand Touchpoints
2.1 Direct Impact, High Involvement
2.2 Direct Impact, Low Involvement
2.3 Indirect Impact, High Involvement
2.4 Indirect Impact, Low Involvement
3 The Inter-relatedness Between Brand Touchpoints
3.1 Causality
3.2 Probability
4 Customer Journey Management—Navigating the Key Questions
4.1 How Many Customer Brand Touchpoints Are Ideal?
4.2 What Is the Composition of Each Customer Brand Touchpoint?
4.3 How Can We Influence the Customer to Interact with Brand Touchpoints in Ways that Are Most Beneficial?
5 Embedding Customer Journey Management
6 Customer Journey Management as a Capability
7 Chapter Summary
References
6: Customer Relationship Management
1 Introduction
2 Customer Relationships, CRM, and CE
3 CRM as Multiple Customer Journeys
4 CRM as a CE Sub-capability
4.1 The Relational Functions of CRM
4.1.1 Choosing the Right Customers
4.1.2 Starting, Building, Keeping, and Ending Customer Relationships
4.2 The Technical Functions of CRM
4.2.1 Marketing Automation
4.2.2 Sales Automation
4.2.3 Service Automation
5 The Components of a CRM Sub-capability
5.1 Customer Acquisition
5.2 Customer Onboarding
5.3 Customer Relationship Maintenance
5.3.1 Managing Customer Enquiries
5.3.2 Enhancing Customer Relationship Value
5.3.3 Enhancing the Customer Bond
5.4 Customer Offboarding
6 Chapter Summary
References
7: Customer Communications
1 Introduction
2 Defining Customer Communications
2.1 Message
2.2 Customer Communications Channels
2.2.1 Asynchronous Communications Channels
2.2.2 Synchronous Communications Channels
2.2.3 Hybrid Communications Channels
2.2.4 Weighing up Explicit Customer Communications Channel Options
2.3 Customer Communications Frequency
2.4 Customer Communications Flows
3 Towards a Customer Communications Capability
3.1 Ordinary Customer Communications Capabilities
3.2 Dynamic Customer Communications Capabilities
4 Proactive and Reactive Customer Communications
5 Monitoring and Evaluating Customer Communications
6 Chapter Summary
References
8: Customer Analytics and Insight
1 Introduction
2 Defining Customer Analytics, Customer Insight and Business Intelligence
2.1 Customer Analytics—What it is, What it is Not
2.2 Customer Insight—What it is, What it is Not
2.3 Business Intelligence—What it is, What it is Not
3 The Components of a Customer Analytics and Insight CE Sub-capability
3.1 Problem Definition
3.2 Planning
3.3 Operations
3.3.1 Data Collection
3.3.2 Analysis
3.3.3 Reporting Insights
3.3.3.1 Insights and the Time-Poor Manager
3.3.3.2 Insights and the Ignorant Manager
3.3.3.3 Insights and Corporate Crises
3.3.3.4 Insights and the Proactive Manager
4 Implementing Customer Analytics and Insight—Some Considerations
5 Chapter Summary
9: CE Capability Maturity
1 Introduction
2 CE Capability and Its Maturity
2.1 CE Sub-capability Internal Consistency Decision Areas
2.2 CE Sub-capability Horizontal Consistency Decision Areas
3 Gauging CE Capability Maturity
3.1 Scenario 1—Low Internal Consistency, Low Horizontal Consistency
3.2 Scenario 2—Low Internal Consistency, High Horizontal Consistency
3.3 Scenario 3—High Internal Consistency, Low Horizontal Consistency
3.4 Scenario 4—High Internal Consistency, High Horizontal Consistency
3.5 The Importance of Context
4 Developing the CE Capability
4.1 Step 1: Build Internal Consistency First
4.2 Step 2: Build Horizontal Consistency
4.3 Dealing with Constraints
5 CE Capability Performance Assessment
5.1 CE Performance Tensions
5.2 CE Performance Metrics
5.2.1 Aggregate Level CE Performance Metrics
5.2.2 Specific Level CE Performance Metrics
5.2.3 A Word on Optimising CE Performance Assessment
6 Chapter Summary
10: Current Issues in Customer Engagement
1 Introduction
2 Customer Engagement and VUCA
3 Emerging Issues Affecting CE
4 CE Developments
5 The Next Steps
6 Chapter Summary
References
Index