For Deepika Pandey, Group Vice President, Digital Marketing and Customer Experience at Walgreens, the company’s ongoing commitment to customer experience, customer loyalty, and customer engagement has elicited a unique result from customers.
“We have more than 8,200 stores and over six million customers visit our stores each day, but when you talk to our customers, many of them refer to their store as “My Walgreens,” Pandey told Loyalty360. “That is the greatest compliment that we can get: We are part of the community and we have an intimate relationship with our customers.”
Championing Customer Experience starts at the top, Pandey said.
“Our President, Alex Gourlay, continues to push the organization to be customer-centric, but every single person in the organization has to be the champion for the customer too,” she said.
The company’s omnichannel approach ensures that it’s incorporating technology across the business, aiming to make it effortless for customers to engage whenever, wherever, and however they prefer.
The highly successful Walgreens Balance Rewards loyalty program launched in September 2012 and currently boasts more than 82 million members. This is an example of the company’s pursuit of customer engagement, customer experience, and customer loyalty. The company’s roughly 240,000 store associates across the country have played a significant role in the program’s success. For Walgreens, the success of the program goes beyond a transactional program. It is part of the overall corporate focus and business strategy, and connects with the brand’s purpose to help people get healthy, stay healthy, and live well.
Pandey said the bar for a great customer experience is always going up and technology is helping to raise these standards.
“It is always challenging to make sure that you are ahead of the innovations that will truly scale to transform the customer experience and invest at the right time,” she said.