Why Customer Satisfaction Hasn’t Budged in 30 Years: Two new guest experts tell us why
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
Release Date: 08/16/2025
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...
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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 ...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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Why Customer Satisfaction Hasn’t Budged in 30 Years: Two new guest experts tell us why
The Intuitive Customer - Helping You Improve Your Customer Experience To Gain Growth
In this milestone episode, The Intuitive Customer undergoes a transformation. Colin Shaw announces a step back from the regular hosting role, prompting a fresh chapter in the podcast’s evolution. Hosts Colin Shaw and Professor Ryan Hamilton introduce two new expert contributors — Dr. Morgan Ward, a consumer psychologist, and Ben Shaw, a brand strategist — to bring fresh perspectives on customer behavior, brand experience, and the future of CX. Together, the four hosts discuss the state of customer experience today, particularly in light of the stagnant growth in the American Customer...
info_outlineIn this milestone episode, The Intuitive Customer undergoes a transformation. Colin Shaw announces a step back from the regular hosting role, prompting a fresh chapter in the podcast’s evolution. Hosts Colin Shaw and Professor Ryan Hamilton introduce two new expert contributors — Dr. Morgan Ward, a consumer psychologist, and Ben Shaw, a brand strategist — to bring fresh perspectives on customer behavior, brand experience, and the future of CX.
Together, the four hosts discuss the state of customer experience today, particularly in light of the stagnant growth in the American Customer Satisfaction Index over the past three decades. They debate metrics versus meaning, the enduring value of physical retail, and the coming wave of non-visual AI-driven brand interactions. The episode sets the stage for a broader, more dynamic take on what it means to truly understand and serve customers in the modern age.
Quote of the Episode
"We're using metrics that are more relevant to the business than to the person actually experiencing the brand."
— Dr. Morgan Ward
Key Takeaways
Customer satisfaction has plateaued: The American Customer Satisfaction Index has barely moved in 30 years, despite huge investments in CX. This calls into question the effectiveness of current CX strategies.
ROI needs to be central: CX professionals must link experience improvements directly to financial returns if they want continued investment.
Metrics can be misleading: Overly relying on simplified metrics like NPS can lead organizations astray, especially when they’re gamed or don’t reflect real consumer emotions.
Retail is making a comeback: Resurgence in physical retail’s emotional power especially among younger consumers who crave tactile experiences.
The future is voice-first: How AI-driven, non-visual brand experiences will redefine customer interaction demanding new forms of design thinking.
Dual focus is key: Brands must balance operational improvements today with strategic planning for a fast-approaching future filled with disruptive technologies.
Resources Mentioned
American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI):
www.acsi.org — Independent benchmark of customer satisfaction in the U.S. since 1994.
About the Hosts:
Colin Shaw is a LinkedIn 'Top Voice' with a massive 284,000 followers and 87,000 subscribers to his 'Why Customers Buy' newsletter. Shaw is named one of the world's 'Top 150 Business Influencers' by LinkedIn. His company, Beyond Philosophy LLC, has been selected four times by the Financial Times as a top management consultancy. Shaw is co-host of the top 1.5% podcast 'The Intuitive Customer'—with over 600,000 downloads—and author of eight best-sellers on customer experience, Shaw is a sought-after keynote speaker. Follow Colin on LinkedIn.
Ryan Hamilton is a Professor of Marketing at Emory University's Goizueta Business School and co-author of 'The Intuitive Customer' book. An award-winning teacher and researcher in consumer psychology, he has been named one of Poets & Quants' "World’s Best 40 B-School Profs Under 40." His research focuses on how brands, prices, and choice architecture influence shopper decision-making, and his findings have been published in top academic journals and covered by major media outlets like The New York Times and CNN. His work highlights how psychology can help firms better understand and serve their customers. Ryan has a new book called “The Growth Dilemma: Managing Your Brand When Different Customers Want Different Things” Harvard Business Press 2025
Ben Shaw
Ben Shaw is Chief Strategy Officer at MullenLowe UK, having also led strategy at BBH and worked client-side with fast-growth start-ups Wheely and Unmind. He’s passionate about how brands can challenge culture convention and create ideas people want to spend time with, working on brands like Audi, Google and Burger King. Beyond advertising, Ben champions mental health awareness and rare disease research, drawing on both personal experience and professional curiosity.
Morgan Ward
Morgan Ward, Ph.D. is a marketing scholar and former professor at Emory University and Southern Methodist University, with over two decades of expertise in consumer behavior and branding. She’s worked with clients ranging from start-ups to global brands, helping them translate behavioral science into strategies that resonate in culture and drive growth. Her academic research explores status, symbolism, and the psychology of consumption, and she has served as an expert witness in federal trademark and trade dress cases. Beyond her academic and consulting work, Morgan is fascinated by how cultural shifts shape what people desire, and how brands can both reflect and influence those desires.
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