class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: left; margin-right: 10px;"> href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.360connext.com%2Fcustomer-experience-shortcuts-dos-donts%2F">
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class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-833" src="http://www.360connext.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/2625766496_e60b979f35-150x112.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="112" />I love shortcuts. My favorite is probably typing in the first two letters of a URL into my browser and being magically transported to the site!

But how can you take shortcuts with your customer experience? Too often, shortcuts within the wrong areas lead to shortfalls and short-sightedness on what really matters.

Based on my experience and the experience of my clients, I’d suggest a simple Do’s and Don’ts set of guidelines on this. Sort of like href="http://www.glamour.com/fashion/2010/12/the-best-dos-and-donts-of-the-year?intcid=top_201010_%20best_of_clarisonic#slide=1" target="_blank">Glamour magazine, minus the hilarious photos.

Do Take Shortcuts:

• Go ahead and automate. Use the awesome technology available to send out your emails, your surveys and your information. Just make sure your recipients are treated as human, even via that automation.

• Use text analytics. Finding a needle in the data haystack is hard enough. Use text analytics to help you find a few needles at once.

• Do what works again and again. I’m not sure why people think it’s bad to do what works. Don’t get bored with your ideas if they are proving worthy. (Remember when href="http://www.gap.com/" target="_blank">Gap decided to href="http://247wallst.com/2010/10/08/gaps-logo-change-adding-brand-damage-gps/" target="_blank">change their logo?)
  
  

Don’t Take Shortcuts:

• Hiring people. Your people, no matter what level they are or what they do, have absolutely the most impact on the experience your customers have with your organization. Don’t cheapen the process or make excuses for hiring crappy people. It will not serve you or your customers.

• Developing Decent Content. Don’t waste people’s time. If that newsletter you send out is automated wonderfully and arrives just on time but is full of crap? Nobody appreciates it. And if your your customer service copy is not worth the time to read it, then start over and take the time you need to make it worthwhile.

• Testing and testing again. If your process looks great from the inside, don’t assume that’s how it works 100% of the time on the outside. Test your processes all the time and from as many different customer angles as you can think of to ensure success.

Shortcuts are important to help us spend the right time on the right things. Where do you think you can take shortcuts?

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