Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Rob Markey, Bain & Company partner and customer experience expert
The Customer Confidential Podcast unlocks a world of unparalleled customer and employee loyalty insights. Host Rob Markey, a Net Promoter System pioneer, uses his deep expertise and empathetic approach to challenge conventional wisdom, peel back layers of typical advice, and expose the real stories of industry transformation. Take a deep dive into discussions on CX, customer journey, customer insights, Net Promoter Score, and more. Every episode is a master class in loyalty. Guests include CMOs, CXOs, and heroes of customer-centric transformation, along with thought leaders who inspire them. Exploring organizational structures, operating models, goals, and metrics, Rob and his guests from companies such as Vanguard, American Express, and more bring to light practical marketing, product, customer experience, and technology strategies for earning customer-focused growth. This podcast is your source for untold stories of customer and employee loyalty. Challenging, insightful, and instructive—all in one place. Earned growth starts here.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Oct 26, 2018 • 34min
Ep. 142: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | The Empathy Remedy in Healthcare
Medical outcomes matter, but they're not the only factor in patient satisfaction. A provider's ability to communicate and express empathy are also critical to the customer experience in healthcare. Host Rob Markey welcomes back Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System. Rob and Maurice discuss the unique customer experience challenges that healthcare providers and organizations face, and how the Net Promoter System can help.
Oct 11, 2018 • 46min
Ep. 141: Jeanne Bliss of CustomerBliss | It's Still About Humans Helping Humans
Host Rob Markey welcomes back Jeanne Bliss, author of the new customer experience book, Would You Do that to Your Mother? In her book, she argues that companies need to humanize the customer experience to help their employees provide the service that customers want. Jeanne also advises senior leaders as founder and president of CustomerBliss, and previously oversaw the customer experience at Land's End, Microsoft, Coldwell Banker and Allstate.
Sep 20, 2018 • 31min
Ep. 140: Comcast's Charlie Herrin | How Follow-up Calls Can Inspire Change
Follow-up calls offer an opportunity to hear real customers describe, in detail, the things that make them love your company, or not. And they can involve senior executives in learning what it's like to be an average customer or an average frontline employee—to get out of the mindset of "corporate" and into the world where customers interact with your company every day. In this episode, Rob Markey continues his conversation with Charlie Herrin, Comcast's chief customer experience officer, who has been leading Comcast's multiyear Net Promoter turnaround. He discusses some of the most important drivers of culture change there.
Sep 6, 2018 • 51min
Ep. 139: Comcast's Charlie Herrin | Inside a Cable Giant's Net Promoter Turnaround
Cable company executives know they have shaky relationships with many customers. In fact, most have been working to improve their customer experience. And one or two are taking truly radical steps to improve. Comcast, one of the biggest Internet providers in the US, is among those working hardest to earn more trust and loyalty from customers. In this episode, Rob Markey talks to Charlie Herrin, Comcast's chief customer experience officer.
Jul 27, 2018 • 51min
Ep. 138: USAA's Julio Estevez-Breton | The Customer Experience-Based Organization
USAA, which primarily serves members of the US military and their families, has some of the most loyal customers in business. How does the company do it? USAA has organized itself around customer episodes—all the steps required to meet a customer's need—instead of products and services. The company has gone beyond identifying and tracking these crucial moments to assigning leaders to manage and enhance them, using Agile methods to speed change. Rob Markey recently spoke with Julio Estevez-Breton, USAA's vice president of member and market insights, about the benefits the company is seeing from this radical approach and what it took to get there.
Jul 13, 2018 • 59min
Ep. 137: FirstService's Charlie Chase | The Business Lessons of Rejection
Rob Markey talks to Charlie Chase, president and CEO of FirstService Brands, which provides property services such as painting, remodeling and storage design through its franchise network. Charlie started as a painting franchise owner in 1982 and went on to start CertaPro Painters, one of the company's brands. FirstService uses the Net Promoter System to collect feedback from not only customers, but also prospects who didn't choose his company's services. This allows FirstService's leaders to identify and address weak service experiences.
Jun 28, 2018 • 46min
Ep. 136: Elwood Staffing's Fernando Cadena | Building Temporary Relationships That Last
Rob Markey welcomes back Fernando Cadena, director of associate engagement at Elwood Staffing Services, which places 25,000 temporary employees at companies across the country. Fernando has been leading the firm's Net Promoter efforts, which began six years ago when he first sought feedback from the company's associates. He has since expanded the company's feedback efforts to its customers. Net Promoter feedback has helped Elwood Staffing improve its customer experience, increase employee retention and build better relationships with the companies it serves.
Jun 14, 2018 • 53min
Ep. 135: Year Up's Garrett Warfield and Jess Britt | Fostering a Feedback Culture
Year Up has helped thousands of young adults leave minimum wage jobs and forge meaningful careers. Its one-year program has served almost 20,000 people since 2000, and the vast majority end up in roles at major companies or in college. Delivering such strong results requires Year Up to balance the needs of its students, donors and the companies that provide critical support and internships. The organization has been using the Net Promoter System to gauge those relationships to ensure that everyone's needs are met. Garrett Warfield, senior director of research and evaluation, and Research and Evaluation Manager Jess Britt say that feedback is simply part of Year Up's culture. In this episode, Rob Markey talks to Garrett and Jess about Net Promoter's role in achieving the organization's mission.
Jun 1, 2018 • 45min
Ep. 134: "Grit" Author Angela Duckworth | Leading with Grit
What do successful leaders have in common? It often comes down to two key traits: passion and perseverance. In other words, they have grit. In this episode, Angela Duckworth, a psychology professor at the University of Pennsylvania, shares insights from her New York Times best-selling book, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. She's also the founder of Character Lab, a nonprofit that works to advance the science of character development.
May 23, 2018 • 39min
Ep. 133: Bain's Jason Barro | The Roadmap to Leadership
When companies set out to dramatically improve their customer experience, they have many decisions to make—where to invest, which markets to go after, which touchpoints to enhance. And there are usually many opinions to consider for each choice. In this episode, Rob Markey talks to Bain Partner Jason Barro about how companies can use a roadmap to leadership to set priorities and find clarity as they work toward customer centricity.
