Building Great Customer Experiences

This book is about building and delivering great customer experiences. Many companies neglect this, but the physical execution and emotional impact of customer experiences, companies and brands may ultimately determine customer satisfaction and loyalty and commercial success. With the use of compelling examples and cases the authors show that this is key for all companies and organisations.

'There are not many people who understand the new paradigm of the Customer Experience. The emerging gurus on the subject are Colin Shaw & John Ivens with their holistic approach. We will all have to embrace the paradigm they are unlocking and focus on our Customer Experience if we are to be successful in the future. At Microsoft we understand the importance of this and are committing ourselves to this new world.' - Steve Harvey, Director of People, Profits & Loyalty, Microsoft

'This book hits the strikezone of how marketers, and organizations overall, need to be thinking to win today. It's a clear roadmap for building a high performance organization crystallized around the customer. Importantly, Shaw and Ivens recognize that emotions are at the core of all relationships - it's no different with customers than our family & friends - and truly engaging and successful brands.' - Barry Herstein, Chief Marketing Officer, Financial Times Group, New York

'John and Colin's innovative approach deserves applause - their thought-leading book is at the cutting edge. Their Seven Philosophies for Building Great Customer Experiences underpin Hilton's own philosophy on how to delight our customers. My endorsement reflects the importance I personally place on the Customer Experience.' - Mike Ashton, Senior Vice President Marketing Worldwide, Hilton International Hotels

'No matter what you are selling - a product or a service, a commodity or a differentiated product - customers are both judge and jury when it comes to deciding whether or not a company succeeds. This book helps companies understand that in order to win in the court of public opinion, they need to build a high-performance organization focused on the customer. Colin Shaw and John Ivens make their case with the best kind of evidence - common sense real-life examples.' - Mohan Kharbanda, Vice President, Customer Experience, Americas, Dell Computers, Texas

'Customer Delight is the great Holy Grail for all of us involved in service or consumer industries but it is all too easy to overcomplicate your approach to achieving it or to finding out what your customers really want. This book by Colin Shaw and John Ivens is packed with clear, common sense advice, analysis and real-world experiences which would help anyone to develop a more effective approach and improve their business as a result.' - Steve Nash, After Sales Director, BMW

'Shaw and Ivens are the gurus of the Customer Experience. Whilst we have all recognised the importance of service in the past, their book moves business thinking on apace. It is about more than just customer service, it is about the whole Customer Experience. Their Seven Philosophies for Building Great Customer Experiences explicitly outline the building blocks that are the foundation of good business.' - Liam Lambert, Director & General Manager, Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park

'John & Colin's approach is the most exciting, practical and effective I have seen in the whole area of becoming a customer focused organisation. We have all talked about the why for years, but now there is no excuse, this is the how.' - Ayes Amewudah, Vice President Marketing Operations EMEA, Lucent Technologies

'A well researched, well written, well presented and thought-provoking read.' - Financial Adviser

'Building Great Customer Experiences does exactly what it says on the tin...Overall, this is a well researched, well written, well presented and thought-provoking read.' - Simon Ashmore, Financial Adviser

'The truth it contains and the challenges to current dogma are brilliant and fundamental to everything we should be doing in marketing.' - Stephen Pidgeon, Markeing

COLIN SHAW is a Founding Partner of Beyond Philosophy, a consultancy company focused upon the customer experience and was formerly Director of Client Experience at BT with overall responsibility for the concept of corporate customer relations in a global context. He has previously worked for Xerox and Mars and is a regular speaker at conferences and in the media on Customer Experience and Emotional Intelligence.

JOHN IVENS is a Founding Partner of Beyond Philosophy. He was previously Head of Customer Experience Futures at BT with responsibility for defining the Customer Experience for Business Customers and implementing programmes to improve the Experience. He has also worked for NatWest Bank and Midlands Electricity.