At Forrester’s CX SF 2019 conference, Melissa Schmidt, Autodesk’s Director of Research, Digital Platform & Experience, gave a presentation that advised brands to consider customer experience holistically across touchpoints. This advice was framed in a narrative about the challenges Autodesk faced because of owning a huge number of digital properties. These include Autodesk.com, which Schmidt called “the main front door of our brand”; Autodesk Accounts; Knowledge Network, which boasts over 1 million articles; and 20 custom sites around the world.
Schmidt noted that, until recently, each digital property was managed by a different team. Because of this, the Autodesk digital experience was seldom discussed in a holistic manner. However, under the leadership of the new Chief Digital Officer, Jeff Kinder, the brand set out to change this status quo.
The first order of business was selecting a new metric to determine customers’ level of digital satisfaction. Previously, Autodesk had been using NPS. As such, the company looked at other brands across verticals, including Airbnb, to see what they were using. The team found that there is no go-to. Today’s brands are using a number of different metrics to assess digital satisfaction.
Of this fact, Schmidt said, “It’s all over the place; there is no standard.”
To help select an actionable metric, Autodesk turned to its partner, Qualtrics. “We actually met with one of their PhD Decision Scientists. This person gave us some great best practices, what they’re seeing that’s working well.”
Qualtrics’ expertise in measurement proved useful in focusing on one satisfaction metric. Ultimately, Schmidt and her team decided to use “effort.” She believes that effort is a better indicator of loyalty than CSAT and that it is also more actionable.
To get data of this metric, Autodesk surveyed users across touchpoints, asking them questions to the effect of, “How easy was this experience?” From this survey, the company established four experience criteria to focus on, and notably, Kinder set specific targets for each team. Schmidt stated that having specific goals energized and motivated the team, making the metrics feel less like abstract numbers to be monitored and more like challenges to be addressed.
This transformation, according to Schmidt, has yielded two positive results. It has lain down a necessary layer of technology to drive strategies, and it has resulted in the adoption of a holistic approach to the digital experience. Now, CX is aligned at Autodesk.
Schmidt concluded by offering five tips for brands looking to transform their approach to CX. These were:
1. Define a simple metric (don’t try to measure ten things at once).
2. Remember that the only baseline that matters is your own.
3. Set a specific target.
4. Ensure executive support.
5. Democratize your VOC data.
The presentation’s focus on selecting a metric was particularly intriguing. Schmidt’s advice—keeping the experience metric simple—is especially poignant, given that most industries have yet to arrive at anything resembling a CX gold standard.