My definition of customer experience remains the same as when I introduced it in 2008:
The perception that customers have of their interactions with an organization.
Our model for customer experience has always been built on three components — functional, accessible, and emotional — which are the underlying elements in the Temkin Experience Ratings. While this model continues to hold up, we’ve decided to change the naming of the components to the following:
- Success (formerly functional): Degree to which customers can accomplish their goals
- Effort (formerly accessible): The difficulty or ease in accomplishing their goals
- Emotion (formerly emotional): How the interaction makes customers feel
The names have changed, but the definitions of the components remain the same. Our Temkin Experience Ratings will also remain the same, so we will continue to be able to compare the results with previous years.
Why did we do this?
We felt as though the new language would simplify our discussions about customer experience. In addition, people are starting to discuss the notion of customer effort, which is an area that we’ve been measuring in our Temkin Experience Ratings since 2011.
The bottom line: Some names have changed, but the CX fundamentals remain the same.
This blog post was originally published by Temkin Group prior to its acquisition by Qualtrics in October 2018.
