To consistently offer your clients the best possible customer experience, it’s good to take a look at other lines of business from time to time. For example, says a report by WARC, tech firms are excellent sources of customer experience wisdom. Tech firms specialize in business-​to-​business (B2B) services, something they have in common with marketers.

Key Attributes of the Customer Experience

WARC reports that there are a few key attributes to upgrading the experience you offer your B2B customers based on advice from tech firms.

Reliability

When your clients were just prospects, they got a small taste of how reliable you are. You're off to a good start if you've kept your appointments and provided them with all the information they requested. But how is your reliability holding up now that the money has changed hands? 

Remember, customer experience management is ongoing until your business relationship ends. Don't let it end because of something you could have done better. Respond quickly when your clients reach out to you. Keep lines of contact open and engaging by sending them content they'd find helpful or customer surveys. Let them know that they can depend on you.

Understanding

Understanding your client’s needs is an enormous aspect when crafting a customer experience strategy. Hopefully, you took the time to get to know the ins and outs of your client’s company and its problems and needs. You should also know your client just as well. 

How do they prefer to be contacted? Was there a promise you made to them that helped positively influence the sale? Have you kept that promise? You need to understand your client’s wants and needs and then adapt this particular client’s experience to reflect them. Anticipating their future needs based on what you already know about them is also a part of this key attribute.

Enrichment

WARC defines this key attribute of customer experience as the acknowledgment of “the individual’s need for belonging, connectedness, and recognition.” You can fulfill all three of these necessary acknowledgments through your outreach. The simplest way to recognize, connect, and create a sense of belonging is by paying attention to both them and their company. 

Send them a card or a small gift on their birthday. Email them when their company accomplishes something to spread the celebration. If you got to know the client more personally during the sales process, reach out to them occasionally to discuss a mutual connection between the two of you. It could be anything from, “Holy crap, last night’s OSU football game!” to “Did you see this week’s episode of The Mandalorian?”

Tailoring the customer experience for each client is becoming more crucial every year. Why? WARC says that millennial and Gen Z decision-​makers under the age of 30 are harsher critics and are more stingy with giving high net promoter scores than their Gen X and baby boomer counterparts. The more time passes, the more members of these generations will come into positions of power in organizations while baby boomers and Gen Xers retire. Make sure you’re prepared!