In the first of this two-part series Gurol discusses real world stories of Central European companies in CX and his approach to CX strategy and execution and how CX differs in this region from typical US approaches (and why) including:

• Central European companies are often older and more conservative, and processes and business models tend to be more durable.
• Meaning companies spend significantly more time in taking things live than more agile USA models but that slower deployment but higher quality results in much lower complaint levels.
• Why this is informed and impacted by Central Europe being a bit behind the USA in terms of competitive ferocity and continuous disruption from startups meaning maybe European companies have luxury of being good enough but also how that will change as competition and disruption increase
• How this supports a greater focus on and stronger organizational muscle in data and analytics. How this affects their CX approach and what are the results?
• How the US is fast to innovate but often slow to reap the benefits vs central Europe slower to innovate but faster to capture the results.
• How Baltic customers are more demanding in terms of providing high satisfaction rankings and ratings than Eurasian customers who tend to like to say nice things about people and how that affect net promoter score measurement.
• How an eastern European education system built around grading students on a 1-5 scale means a 10-point 10-point NPS scale is very hard to implement and why smart companies redesign that score to fit the 5 point scale so customers can respond appropriately.
• Why the best companies don’t focus on comparing the scores between different countries, they focus on the improvements and trends in the scores for a given market
• Why product quality in central Europe is often considered more important than proactive service (which may even be offensive and invasive) but that service after it is requested is critical
• Discuss how real-world companies like MetroCC, the multinational retailer, and Bosch, the multinational engineering and technology company, approach CX in different markets by deeply understanding their specific customers and what complaints they hear and address
• And what US and other companies looking to be successful in these markets should consider and do

Resources

• AlternaCX 5 major trends report
• Forrester Analytics Business Technographics® Priorities And Journey Survey, 2021 – European underinvestment in CX

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