Location-based intelligence helps deliver a complete customer experience

Recently, I found myself in the market for a new television. I did lots of online research, sifting through features and customer reviews until I found one that fit my needs and budget.

Several online retailers offered two-day delivery for my TV of choice, but there was a local store whose website claimed to have one in stock that very day. When I got there, though, I found it very difficult to find an employee to help me. When I finally flagged someone down, they told me the TV was out of stock and their website inventory was out of date. Then, they told me to try calling their second location and walked away. Needless to say, I left a negative online review of that retailer and purchased my TV elsewhere.

I promise I’m not telling this story (just) to vent about lousy service. My story illustrates how complex the consumer journey has become, how many factors impact brand satisfaction, and the risks to your brand if you can’t get customer experience right.

The modern customer journey blends the digital with the physical

Industries like retail, restaurants and quick-serve restaurants, and hospitality have made major investments in digital experiences to better serve the evolving needs of their customers. But for many consumers, the digital element doesn’t replace the physical experience; it complements that experience.

Take my TV example. That single purchase was a mix of both kinds of experiences, including:

• Visits to several websites for product research on prices and features
• References to multiple positive and negative online product reviews
• Inventory comparisons of online and physical retail locations
• A trip to a brick-and-mortar storefront with the intent to purchase
• Interactions with multiple in-person and virtual customer service agents
• My own online review about inventory and service levels across social channels
• Online purchase through an eCommerce platform
  

There will always be reasons that a physical brand experience is necessary or preferred — a convenient store location, uncertainty about the fit or quality of an item, accessibility of a quick drive-thru snack, or simply the luxury of dinner in a nice restaurant. To understand these factors and create a complete customer experience, you need location-specific insights.

4 ways location-based intelligence can create better CX

Even though many brand experiences still have a physical component, the customer comment card is definitely a relic of the analog past. These days, nearly all feedback you receive comes through digital channels. Yelp alone featured 244 million reviews as of December 2021, and that’s only one of dozens of social, messaging, or other digital channels where consumers share their experiences.

Each review represents a unique experience at one location, but it can still impact perception of your overall brand, expose larger problems, or uncover best-practices that could apply to the entire company. Location-based intelligence lets you dive deeper to ensure your customers have the same seamless experience wherever they shop. Here’s four ways to use location intelligence for better CX:

1. Cover the fundamentals

Clean facilities, friendly and knowledgeable staff, timely service, and well-stocked inventory are essential for retail stores or restaurants. Fair or not, one off day at a single location can create a negative impression for the whole brand. Location-based intelligence helps you identify specific locations that struggle in these areas, so you can give them the support and resources they need to fix the problem.

Location intelligence also helps you recognize patterns of behavior that might indicate larger issues. For example, reviews complaining that items are out of stock may point to previously unknown risks in your supply chain. Feedback that bathrooms are consistently low on supplies might inspire a change in regular maintenance schedules, and routinely low service reviews might indicate the need to reevaluate training or hiring practices.

2. Learn from the competition

With the right solution, you can benchmark location-specific data against your competitors in hotly contested markets to see what’s working or not working for them. Even if your store is performing well, these insights can help you understand the specific factors that matter most to customers in a given region to ensure you continue to stay ahead of the pack.

3. Surface innovative solutions to complex problems

One major North American restaurant chain noticed repeated negative reviews about long wait times and slow service at several locations. There are a number of interrelated factors that impact service speed, any one of which could be at the root of the problem. Without excellent data, the brand couldn’t isolate the culprit.

Location analytics allowed them to compare their fastest-service locations with struggling locations. They discovered that slower locations shared a different floor plan that created inefficiencies. After making a change, service scores went up across the board. They realized that the new layout not only made movement easier but also increased communication among kitchen, wait, and host staff so everyone was more aligned. It solved an acute problem and gave the chain richer insight into hidden issues that might be impacting customer experience.

4. Integrate with other data to unify CX teams

Customer reviews often include multiple pieces of information your brand can use. Take this Yelp review:

“Parking lot is always full of stray carts that have rolled into my car many times, and they’re always out of Brand X cereal. It’s the only kind with my favorite strawberry flavor. Never going there again!”

This review is negative, but it offers important customer details about facilities, inventory, product features, and competitors. There’s certainly work to be done, but it’s the kind of data that should be shared with operations, product development, marketing, and facilities management.

Unfortunately, most brands work in silos with multiple point solutions, so there’s no simple way to share real-time insight like this with everyone that needs it. Select a unified customer experience management (Unified-CXM) platform that includes location-based intelligence, so you can capture, share, and act on multi-team insights fast.

Sprinklr’s Location Insights gives brands the edge in complete customer experience

No matter where you set up shop, it’s important that your brand is there to deliver experiences worthy of a five-star review. Location Insights, part of Sprinklr Insights, uncovers real-time customer feedback from top review sites, so you can:

• Understand sentiment at every touchpoint across the consumer journey
• Combine location-specific reviews of facilities, inventory, and service into a single Experience Score
• Benchmark location performance against top competitors
• Integrate review insights with first-party data in the only Unified-CXM platform, helping every CX team take action faster

Register for access to our Location Insights demo so you never miss an opportunity to correct a bad experience or make a great one even better.

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