Many CX projects fail despite big budgets, survey finds

Joyce Abaño

19th Feb 2019

Over three quarters (77 per cent) of retail organisations in Australia said they have had a number of failed customer experience (CX) projects.

About a third (35 per cent) said as many as 20 to 40 per cent of such projects have failed, despite the fact that big dollars were involved.

With the number of companies spending on CX projects rising, Microsoft has urged retail businesses to tackle data blindspots to reduce the risk of costly failed customer experience projects and amplify the impact of data for customers and employees.

While most Australian enterprises (69 per cent) say they have an integrated digital transformation strategy, only 28 per cent have a company-wide strategy for sharing data, according to a new study commissioned by Microsoft Australia.

The study shows that without access to a comprehensive array of data, retail organisations will be limited in their ability to intelligently use data to engage customers, empower people, optimise and automate processes, and transform products and services.

When asked about the importance of data in terms of automating business processes, 80 per cent of retail sector respondents said it was “somewhat to extremely” important, the study revealed.

Seventy-seven per cent said the same about access to data to gain a 360-degree view of the customer; and 74 per cent said it was somewhat to extremely important for generating a real time insight into the pipeline of opportunities.

The research showed, however, that in spite of the critical role data plays in CX transformation, almost a third (30 per cent) of the respondents of the survey said that there is little to no data sharing across the organisation.

“The enterprise blindspots this creates is causing many transformation efforts to fail to reach their full potential,” Microsoft said in a statement about the report.

Respondents across all three sectors reported that the biggest challenges they faced included being able to customise offers and bundle products and services with personal pricing; modify go-to-market strategies in real time; gaining a 360-degree view of the customer; and validating and testing new ideas. All of which require access to the right data at the right time.

Retail businesses scored themselves particularly poorly in terms of their ability to collect and action feedback from customers and staff across multiple channels; personalise each customer interaction; and, identify weak points in the customer journey, the study showed.

“It’s really important that retail businesses identify and tackle their digital blindspots – and introduce policies, processes and technology that lets data help draft the organisational transformation blueprint,” said Michael O’Keefe, Business Applications director at Microsoft.

O’Keefe said crafting corporate-wide data sharing policies and implementing technology that allows all of a retailer’s data to be accessed when and where it is required is critical, adding that it is the best way to optimise decision making and take informed action across the organisation.