Want to create a better customer experience? Start with employee engagement

Forrester finds that at customer-obsessed firms, employees are 28% more likely to report being happy at work, which contributed to higher employee accountability, more innovation, and lower attrition, among other benefits. Customer satisfaction is a key driver of business growth. But, in order to maintain a great customer experience your employees’ experience needs to be just as powerful.  

The secret to a great customer experience strategy 

Positive customer experience and employee engagement go hand-in-hand, but it goes further than that. Employees are the face of your business. They’re the ones who interact with customers, so it’s important to make sure they have a positive experience as well.

Employees can be the best ambassadors for your brand and can improve the customer experience by providing helpful information and insight into how your company works. It’s important that you consider not just what your employees need from you as managers but also how they can help shape the culture of your organization by being more open-minded, empathetic listeners who care about others’ experiences. 

3 Ways to create a better employee experience 

If you want to improve your customers’ experiences, start with your own employees. Here’s how:   

1. Create in an internal culture of listening and learning 

As a company, you need to listen to your customers and understand their needs. But you also need your employees to feel comfortable sharing their honest opinions about what’s working well in the company and where there are opportunities for improvement.  

Host regular all-hands meetings to openly discuss important company-wide matters. You can also send out surveys where everyone can anonymously share their thoughts — both good and bad — on everything from customer service levels at the front desk to online support systems and all the way up through leadership roles within the organization itself (e.g., managers). Consistent feedback and accessibility to leadership can help create a better employee experience. 

2. Show care for employees who are in customer-facing roles 

If employees feel appreciated and respected by management, they’re more likely to go above and beyond in their interactions with others (including customers). This can help reduce negative interactions between customers and staff members who may otherwise feel undervalued or frustrated by poor management practices at work. 

3. Empower your employees by setting them up for success 

When employees feel valued by their employer —and empowered by training programs that teach them how important their role is in providing excellent customer service — they’re more likely to provide better customer experiences themselves. 

A critical component to delivering a strong customer experience is having your employees stay in their role for a long time. The more turnover a customer must navigate, the more change management that customer must go through. In fact, Forrester research found that disengaged employees are 12 times more likely to leave in the next 12 months than engaged employees. On the flip side, “by better enabling employees for success and improving the overall engagement of their employees, employers will find better retention results, which in turn can have a positive effect on overall business outcome.” 

How Limeade helps drive employee well-being and engagement 

Limeade drives employee well-being improvement in several ways such as: 

1. Meeting employees where they are, in the flow of work 
   This allows your employees to find moments in their workday to engage in activities that are good for their well-being. 

2. Real-time communication  
   Limeade is the only well-being vendor that sits on a communications engine — enabling employees to receive messaging and information that’s relevant to them. In doing so, Limeade customers increase awareness and utilization of their benefits by up to 2-5x. 

3. Consumer-grade experience 
   The well-being program experience makes employees feel connected to each other and inspires healthy behaviors.  

Start your journey to improve employee engagement with Limeade

Limeade is on a mission to help companies create exceptional customer and employee experiences. Contact us for more information on starting a well-being program today.