Recently, I had the opportunity to speak at a Digital Travel Marketing Conference on the slightly side topic relative to my day-to-day of Customer Experience (CX). Whilst as head of paid media and planning it may not be immediately obvious why I chose this theme, however optimising paid media performance in the platform and engaging customers with thumb-stopping creative is only half the story.

Onsite customer experience has a huge impact on our campaigns’ performance. Just ask yourself, if you search specifically for a brand, clicked a hyper relevant and personalised ad, only to be delivered a slow, generic website which isn’t user friendly, you wouldn’t consider going elsewhere, I know I have.

Another key insight from Google is that 95% of people keep visiting travel related sites after booking, and 74% of people research a trip after completing a booking. Forrester insights have shown that brands are still focusing on the pre-purchase stage of the cycle, and less on the post-purchase phase. Think about your own purchase cycle. What’s more front of mind when you make a repeat purchase, the initial contact you had with the brand when they wanted you to buy, or the more recent experience post purchase, when you needed support with returns or looking for advice?

Developing a CX is in theory straightforward, but the reality is often quite different. Here are the biggest challenges brands have with developing a step-change in their customer journey

Company buy-in – everyone needs to know and understand why CX is so important to the business

Map the CX elements to the business goals – make the purpose tangible from a profit perspective

Develop organisational partnerships – establish and foster champions and working groups which span across the business brough together with the single goal of developing an award winning CX

A centre of excellence team whose purpose it is to work on these projects can really give focus and motivation.

In sectors such as travel, where customer loyalty poses a challenge, you can improve customer lifetime value by focusing on CX, delivering customers simple, usable and engaging journeys to purchase and repeat purchase. Whilst the pre-purchase stages are important, don’t forget your post-purchase CX, which in many cases is the most recent experience a customer will have prior to repeat purchase. Developing a strong CX isn’t an easy task, but by starting with small steps, insights into what you need to achieve and getting a team together to make it happen, steady progress can be made.