Managing Rising Customer Expectations With Limited Resources
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Release Date: 09/28/2024
The Rise of Synthetic Audiences: Fast, Cheap… but Believable?
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
In this episode of The Intuitive Customer, Professor Ryan Hamilton is joined by Ben Shaw, seasoned brand strategist, to unpack the promises and pitfalls of synthetic audiences - AI-driven research used for faster, cheaper market research. Synthetic audiences, powered by large language models (LLMs), can replicate customer segments and respond to creative concepts or product questions at scale cutting the time and cost of traditional surveys. But does it come with trade-offs? Expect lively debate on the AI vs. LLM naming debate, the enduring value of ethnography and nuance, and practical...
info_outline
Are Your Salespeople Sabotaging Your Customer Experience?
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Sales and Customer Experience—two critical functions that should work together, but too often operate at odds. This week, Colin and Ryan explore how traditional sales tactics can undermine long-term loyalty and create organisational silos. They share personal stories (including Colin’s car-buying nightmare) and practical advice for aligning sales with your desired customer experience. If you want to sell AND build trust, this episode is for you. Best Quote of the Episode: "If you can’t proudly stand behind the experience you’re creating, you’ve got a problem." — Colin Shaw Key...
info_outline
The New Currency of Customer Experience: 'People Like Me'
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Trust in traditional institutions is eroding. As customers lose faith in advertising, government and even online reviews, they’re turning to voices that feel most relatable: peers and communities. Edelman’s latest Trust Barometer shows the most credible spokesperson for a company is now “people like me.” Ben Shaw and Professor Ryan Hamilton explore the decline of influencer credibility, the rise of community-driven word-of-mouth, the tension between authenticity and control, and why attention + trust will be the “coins of the realm” for brands in the decade ahead. 🔑 Key...
info_outline
Good Friction, Bad Friction: Why a Little Effort Makes Customers Care
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Episode Overview When everything is one-click easy, do we lose something meaningful? Guest host Dr. Morgan Ward joins Dr. Ryan Hamilton to explore how the right amount of friction in the consumption experience can boost connection, meaning, and long-term use of the product—while the wrong kind just gets in the way. Quote of the Episode “Consumption, in some ways, has just gotten too easy.” — Dr. Morgan Ward 🔑 Key Takeaways Easier isn’t always better. Ultra-frictionless buying can strip away the identity, discovery, and accomplishment that make buying feel meaningful....
info_outline
I Signed a ‘Gag Order’. Here’s What It Taught Me About Organizations
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
In this episode, Colin Shaw shares a recent personal experience with a major brand that imposed a 'gag order' (NDA) after a poor service experience — and how this reflects a deeper organizational issue: silos. Together with Professor Ryan Hamilton, Colin explores why siloed thinking leads to incoherent customer experiences, how internal motivations can conflict with CX goals, and what leaders must do to ensure learning, trust, and advocacy remain priorities. A must-listen for CX professionals and senior leaders alike. Best Quote: "Who decides? That is the question every leadership team...
info_outline
The Thrill of the Chase: Why Anticipation Beats Ownership
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Episode Overview Ever buy something you couldn’t wait to get—and then let it sit in the box for days (or weeks)? You’re not alone. Guest host Morgan Ward joins Ryan Hamilton to explore why we often love the pursuit of products more than the possession of them. From unopened tools and “someday” sweaters to the viral Stanley Cup craze, they unpack the psychology of anticipation, dopamine, and why the thrill fades once the package arrives. This episode reveals what’s really driving that “add to cart” impulse—and how brands can design experiences that move customers from wanting...
info_outline
When Rebrands Go Wrong: Lessons for Customer Experience Leaders
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
In this episode of The Intuitive Customer, Professor Ryan Hamilton is joined by guest host Ben Shaw to explore the high-stakes world of rebranding. From Cracker Barrel’s logo backlash to Jaguar’s radical design overhaul, they unpack what happens when brands chase new audiences at the expense of their loyal customers. The conversation dives into the tension between rebranding vs. repositioning, why heritage brands face special challenges, how politics and culture can hijack brand decisions, and practical lessons for leaders trying to grow without alienating their core base. Key Takeaways ...
info_outline
AI That Listens: Why Real-Time Feedback is the Future of Customer Experience
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Summary Traditional customer feedback is broken. Post-call surveys and quarterly reports are too slow, cumbersome, and overly focused on the company’s needs rather than the customer’s reality. By the time insights land on a dashboard, the customer has already left—or worse, lost trust. In this episode of The Intuitive Customer, I (Colin Shaw) and Professor Ryan Hamilton sit down with Devidas Desai, SVP of Product Leader at ASAPP, to explore how AI that listens is reshaping the way organizations understand and respond to customers in the moment. We delve into why silence doesn’t mean...
info_outline
Brand Archetypes: Straightjacket or Springboard for CX?
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
In this episode of The Intuitive Customer, Professor Ryan Hamilton is joined by guest co-host Ben Shaw, Chief Strategy Officer at MullenLowe, to explore the enduring role of brand archetypes in marketing and customer experience. They revisit the origins of archetypes in Jungian psychology and the influential book The Hero and the Outlaw (Pearson & Mark), before debating how useful the framework remains today. Together, they discuss the power of archetypes to create consistency, unlock creativity, and guide internal decision-making while also recognizing their limitations, risks of...
info_outline
Your Customers are Lazy... and Bored: How to Use That to Your Advantage
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Your Customers are Lazy... and Bored: How to Use That to Your Advantage Show Notes: This week on The Intuitive Customer, Colin takes a step back and welcomes guest host Morgan Ward to explore one of psychology’s favourite contradictions: why customers cling to the familiar, yet crave novelty. From music playlists to yogurt purchases, from comfort food to product design, Colin and Morgan unpack why we’re wired for both—and how brands can use that tension to create better customer experiences. Best Quote from the Episode “Familiarity earns trust. Novelty earns attention. Get the...
info_outlineClaire Dunwood has a pickle. She wants to know how to manage rising customer expectations with fewer resources than she used to have. This episode seeks to help her—and you—do exactly that.
It’s pretty common to hear problems like this today. Responding to rising expectations is easy when there is no limit to the resources you can throw at it. Doing that same thing on a budget is a different kettle of fish.
We kick off by exploring how expectations form. Expectations for experiences, even for those we've never had, are often built from adjacent or similar experiences, drawing on memories, media, or past interactions. Therefore, customers have preconceived notions about how their interactions with your brand will unfold, even before they’ve engaged with you.
Claire noted that customer expectations seem to be constantly rising. Effective management of rising expectations requires identifying which aspect of the expectations is rising—rational, emotional, or sensory—and whether it aligns with your business goals. We discuss the importance of focusing on the aspects that drive the most value for customers rather than trying to meet every rising expectation.
A key takeaway is the importance of focusing on what matters most to your customers, as highlighted by the Blue Ocean Strategy. This approach suggests excelling in the most important areas to your customers and letting go of everything else. Knowing your customers well is essential, as it helps you decide which expectations to meet and which to disregard, ensuring that you spend your resources wisely.
In this episode, we share practical strategies for managing customer expectations, including understanding customer needs, proactive communication, setting clear boundaries, maintaining consistency, and leveraging technology. These strategies help balance the demands of rising expectations with the reality of limited resources.
In this episode, we also talk about:
-
The formation of customer expectations from adjacent experiences
-
The categorization of expectations into rational, emotional, and sensory
-
The concept of outcome-based prioritization when resources are limited
-
The role of transparency and proactive communication in managing expectations
-
How to decide whether certain customers are worth the effort based on their expectations and profitability
-
Examples of businesses effectively setting and exceeding customer expectations
-
The importance of staying agile and responsive to customer feedback