Shows
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 255: Jason Guardino and Karen San | How Turning 18 Can Break Your Relationship With HealthcareEpisode 255: One of healthcare’s biggest blind spots? When patients turn 18. It’s the moment they age out of pediatrics and fall headfirst into a system designed to prioritize older, sicker adults. Physicians, stretched thin, reserve energy for complex cases, giving young adults shorter visits and less attention. That means early signs of medical trouble, like anxiety or preventive needs, go missed. Jason Guardino and Karen San, care experience experts at The Permanente Medical Group, are addressing this massive and often invisible problem head-on. The Permanente Medical Group found that younger patients in their twenties and thirties consi...
2025-08-2120 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 253: Mathieu Staniulis & Séverine Clairet | Blinded by Pride: Inside a 125-Year-Old Co-Op’s Return to Customer-CentricityEpisode 253: Desjardins thought its cooperative roots made it member-first by default. Then members started leaving. Desjardins is a 125-year-old financial co-op based in Quebec. It has deep community ties and a proud history. But that pride masked a painful truth: Members no longer saw it as customer-centric. The organization believed its cooperative structure guaranteed loyalty—until low NPS scores and rising member churn showed otherwise. Mathieu Staniulis and Séverine Clairet recount how Desjardins confronted its own mythology, restructured governance, and began treating feedback as a system, not a score. Desjardins’ wake-up call came...
2025-08-0424 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 251: Mike Valanzola | Many Voices, No Shared Truth: How Dell Revitalized Its Customer Feedback System with Help from the CXRAEpisode 251: In 2018, Dell set out to do something big: turn customer feedback into a system that could not only provide insights, but help set priorities and run the business. They had the data. They had the intent. But they made a compromise that many organizations settle on: Rather than enforce one unified approach to customer feedback, they allowed each team to build its own. While this helped with initial adoption and change management, it also led to fragmentation—multiple tools, different methods, no shared truth. And it got worse over time. Real progress ultimately would require centralizing wh...
2025-07-1738 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 250: Sean McEntire | A Decade of Discipline: From NPS Pilot to Outer Loop PowerhouseEpisode 250: Comcast solved the age-old problem of how to make employee suggestions a powerful, reliable source of value-driving improvements at scale. Sean McEntire, Comcast’s Vice President of Customer Strategy and Operations, explains how the Outer Loop channels every employee elevation—no matter how small—through a disciplined screen, assigns a named owner, and tracks progress in public view. Ninety thousand teammates now feed a single pipeline that forces scattered ideas into accountable hands and verified fixes, solving 7,000 customer pain points so far. A frontline agent’s push for an easy‑to‑use, large‑button remote shows the...
2025-07-1424 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 249: Scott Taber | Why Four Seasons Turned Guests AwayEpisode 249: When “revenge travel” brought guests roaring back to Four Seasons Hotels, they capped occupancy, turning away guests and revenue. Scott Taber, senior vice president of global hospitality, describes the Four Seasons philosophy: No points, no perks. Just great properties, individual recognition, personal service, and an emphasis on making sure the first five minutes after check-in are spectacular. That belief was put to the test when the world started traveling again and labor gaps persisted at the end of the pandemic. The company had a choice: chase revenue or protect intimacy. It chose intimacy. T...
2025-07-1043 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 248: Utibe Bassey | Restoring Power, Recharging Customer ExperienceEpisode 248: At Dominion Energy, keeping the lights on isn’t just a priority—it’s the single biggest driver of customer experience. But as customer expectations continue to evolve, the bar keeps rising. Customers don’t just want to know when their power will be back, they want to know why it is out. And they expect that experience to be as seamless, informed, and intuitive as downloading and using their favorite mobile apps. Meeting those expectations requires transparency, empathy, and a companywide commitment to service. In this episode, Utibe Bassey, vice president of customer experien...
2025-06-1233 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 247: Mari Cross | These B2B Customers Don’t Buy Features. They Buy Outcomes.Episode 247: What if customers achieve real results—but don’t know it? Most vendors sell functionality. Mari Cross wants customers to see impact—in their own numbers, in real time. Mari Cross, Chief Customer Officer at Infor, is dismantling a common illusion: that delivering software features equals delivering value. Infor sells enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools, but Mari's focus is on proving business outcomes. She built a system where customers define the results that matter, track them through the product itself, and act on them with confidence. Her team isn’t there to rescue implementations. They’re...
2025-05-2940 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 246: Deon Nicholas | A Glimpse of the AI Future—It’s Here TodayEpisode 246: The AI future of customer service is already here—and it’s better than most people think. In this episode, Deon Nicholas, President and Executive Chairman of Forethought, joins host Rob Markey to show us how some companies are already using AI to resolve customer issues end-to-end in ways we could barely imagine just a couple of years ago. Deon introduces us to agentic AI: an emerging class of intelligent agents that take real action, integrate across enterprise systems, and adapt to each customer’s needs. Drawing on his experience building Forethought’s platform, Deon reveals how thes...
2025-05-1541 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 245: Eduardo Roma | When Effortless Digital Isn’t Enough: Competing on Customer RelationshipsEpisode 245: What happens when digital transformation becomes table stakes—and customer relationships become the real differentiator? Eduardo Roma, Global Head of Customer Experience Transformation at Bain, believes companies that spent years optimizing transactions and digitizing every interaction are now unprepared for what matters most: becoming more humanized. The human element is now critical, and efficiency can’t be mistaken for real connection. Eduardo outlines three forces reshaping customer experience: Digital is now table stakes, customer power has surged to new heights, and predictive, data-driven relationships are setting brands apart. Too many organizations still equat...
2025-05-0131 min
The Late Start ShowRob Markey on Leadership, Customer Loyalty, and Lessons from University School | Season 1, Ep 27In Episode 27 of The Late Start Show, Charlie Martin and Jack Nelson sit down with Rob Markey, a University School alum, author, speaker, podcast host, and management consultant at Bain & Company. Mr. Markey reflects on his journey from US to Brown University to Harvard Business and into the world of consulting, where he helped develop the Net Promoter System, a widely used customer loyalty metric. He shares how his experiences at US—from impactful teachers to working on The Mabian—shaped his curiosity and career path, as well as the unexpected turns that led him to Bain & Company, where he h...
2025-03-2047 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 244: Eric Almquist | The Value Experience: Why Adding Elements of Value Adds Company ValueEpisode 244: What defines a differentiated customer experience? It starts with a clear framework for measuring intangible value and making calculated trade-offs. In this special tribute show, we revisit our 2016 conversation with Eric Almquist, a former partner at Bain & Company, on the Elements of Value. This framework transforms how businesses understand loyalty, brand equity, and growth. Inspired by Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Eric made value practical, categorizing 30 elements into functional, emotional, life-changing, and social impact levels. His research connected the dots between delivering on multiple elements and revenue growth. Learn how successful industry leaders deliberately la...
2025-03-0613 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 243: Cutler Andrews | When an 8% Donor Base Funds a University: Unlocking Hidden Alumni Engagement OpportunitiesEpisode 243: At Emory University, 99% of donations come from just 8% of donors. It’s a small alumni minority funding almost the majority of the university. This raises a big question: How do you cultivate loyalty among everyone else? In this episode, Emory’s Chief Experience Officer, Cutler Andrews, describes how they’re dismantling silos—by merging alumni relations, donor relations, and events—to offer a cohesive experience. They’re seeing success. Within five years, Emory’s engagement nearly doubled from 28,000 to 54,000 participating alumni. Learn how Emory’s four engagement metrics (philanthropy, attendance, communications, and volunteering) feed a carefully desi...
2025-02-0635 min
The Strategy Skills Podcast: Strategy | Leadership | Critical Thinking | Problem-Solving519: Bain & Company's Partner Rob Markey on Customer Strategy, Customer Loyalty and Retention (Strategy Skills classics)In this episode with Rob Markey, we will discuss valuing and measuring customer loyalty. Rob highlights the gap between executives' intentions to prioritize customers and their actual practices, noting that only 8% of customers believe they receive exceptional experiences, despite 80% of executives thinking so. Rob discusses the need for companies to measure and manage customer lifetime value, using tools like Net Promoter Scores and customer segmentation. He also discusses the challenges of implementing customer-centric strategies, the importance of relationship recovery, and the role of leadership in driving these changes. Rob Markey is a partner and director a...
2025-01-201h 07Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 242: Kunal Madhok | The Black Box Fallacy: Why Wells Fargo Doesn't Trust an AI It Can't ExplainEpisode 242: Wells Fargo has established a clear position on artificial intelligence: If you can't explain how an AI model works, you shouldn't deploy it. This stance challenges the common assumption that black box algorithms are acceptable costs of advanced AI capabilities. In this episode, Kunal Madhok, Head of Data, Analytics, and AI for Wells Fargo's consumer business, reveals how the bank has operationalized this philosophy to enhance customer experiences while maintaining rigorous standards for model explainability and ethical deployment. The stakes for financial institutions are substantial. As banking becomes increasingly digitized, organizations must balance sophisticated pers...
2025-01-1637 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 241: Abhii Parakh & Mike Estep | Flawless Over Flashy: Prudential's Unconventional Path to Customer Experience LeadershipEpisode 241: When is mastering the basics a differentiator? In an industry where complexity is the norm, Prudential Group Insurance has made a counterintuitive strategic choice. While many companies chase innovation through digital transformation and enhanced features, Prudential has discovered that operational excellence—the "absence of noise"—can be a more powerful differentiator. Abhii Parakh and Mike Estep reveal why group insurance demands a fundamentally different approach to customer experience than high-touch industries like hospitality or travel. For Prudential, success depends not on bells and whistles, but on excelling at the foundational elements: reliable execution, friction-free processes, and consist...
2024-12-1938 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 240: Caroline Lombardi | The Evolution of the Chief Customer Officer: From Scorekeeper to CEO SuccessorEpisode 240: How has the Chief Customer Officer (CCO) role evolved over time? Traditionally focused on tracking metrics, CCOs now play a proactive and forward-facing role in driving business innovation. In this episode, Caroline Lombardi, Global Head of the Hospitality & Leisure Practice at Egon Zehnder, explores the CCO role’s dramatic evolution. Customer experience—no longer just about tracking satisfaction or retention—has become a valuable springboard for boosting revenue and gaining a competitive edge. Successful CCOs are skilled in holistic customer experiences, from call centers to broader operations. Caroline outlines three emerging CCO models...
2024-10-3124 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 239: Dan McCarthy | Food for Thought: How External Data Analysis Can Unlock Competitive InsightsEpisode 239: What hidden insights can customer behavior data analysis reveal about how successful one food delivery app may be over another? Discover how analysis of externally sourced customer behavior data can fuel dramatic improvements in revenue forecasts and strategic decisions. See how competitor data analysis can help identify strengths and weaknesses that are otherwise hidden. In this episode of Customer Confidential, we’re joined by Dan McCarthy, director and co-founder of Theta and Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business. Dan shares findings from Theta and Bain & Com...
2024-10-1729 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 238: Brian Higgins | Building AI Trust: Verizon’s Bold Bet on Deliberate ProgressEpisode 238: In what appears to be a paradox, Verizon is accelerating its responsible AI journey through a measured, deliberate approach—ensuring its technology is primed to enhance customer experiences when they matter most. Verizon isn’t rushing to put AI in front of customers. Instead, they’re deliberately building trust, refining data quality, and rigorously testing their AI tools internally. This methodical strategy might seem slow, but is accelerating their progress toward a future where AI can take on a bigger, more direct, customer-serving role. In this episode, Brian Higgins, chief customer experience officer at Verizo...
2024-09-0542 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 237: Murli Buluswar | From Analytics to Outcomes: Creating Data-Driven Insights at CitiHow does democratizing intelligence enhance productivity and drive smarter decision-making? Murli Buluswar, Citigroup’s Head of Analytics for the US Personal Bank, joins host Rob Markey to explore Citi’s strategies for democratizing intelligence. Murli emphasizes building a conversational intelligence platform that enables proactive and reactive insights to reduce friction between curiosity, insight, and decision-making. This approach enhances organizational efficiency, boosts productivity, and sparks more complex problem-solving. Taking a scientific approach, Citi treats customer experience as a key growth strategy. Murli shares how small improvements in customer experience can boost long-term retention and how investing in m...
2024-08-1549 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 236: David Tudehope & Joseph Michelli | “Zig When They Zag”: Macquarie's Customer-Centric RevolutionEpisode 236: When telecom rivals offered lower rates and bigger networks, Macquarie bet big on customer loyalty—and won. David Tudehope, Macquarie Technology Group’s CEO, joins Rob Markey to discuss Macquarie’s competitive differentiator: a bold, customer-centric approach. David co-founded Macquarie to prioritize exceptional customer experience over price and network quality competition. Joining David is Joseph Michelli, author of Customer Magic: The Macquarie Way, who shares a key moment about how a product launch was postponed and short-term profits were sacrificed due to customer need misalignment. "We weren't living our purpose if we procee...
2024-07-1137 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 235: Jon Freier | From Near Death to NPS Disrupter: T-Mobile’s Journey to Customer LeadershipEpisode 235: In 2012, T-Mobile lost nearly two million customers. Its revenue fell precipitously. Its situation seemed hopeless. Then came a new CEO with an audacious plan and a penchant for F-bombs. Jon Freier, president of T-Mobile’s US Consumer Group, joins host Rob Markey to share his firsthand account of the remarkable corporate turnaround. Jon describes the “Un-carrier” strategy, from its risky beginnings to its industry-reshaping impact. He shares how T-Mobile broke the mold, challenged conventions, and ultimately won over customers by putting their needs first. According to Jon, “The whole premise of the Un-carrier movement was abou...
2024-06-2035 min
The Joyous PodcastAligning Customer Experience and Employee Motivation, the past present and future with Rob MarkeyMike chats to Rob Markey, the acclaimed co-author of 'The Ultimate Question', a key developer of the Net Promoter System (NPS) and "The Vince Lombardi of Customer Experience".
Discover insights into customer loyalty, the origins and evolution of NPS, and the pivotal role of simplicity and actionable feedback in transforming customer experience. Rob shares personal stories, his thoughts on common mistakes in customer feedback strategies, and his vision for the future of customer and employee experience in a tech-driven world.
(00:37) Introducing Rob Markey: The Vince Lombardi of Customer Loyalty
(03:40...
2024-05-2150 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 234: Naiara De León & Madison Dyal Anderson | All Customers Just Want to Belong: What Defines an Inclusive Retail Experience?Why do some retailers excel at creating a welcoming environment for a diverse customer base while others fall short? Bain & Company's Naiara De León and Madison Dyal Anderson discuss their research on how companies that excel in customer advocacy and inclusion consistently outperform their peers by a staggering 10 percentage points annually. Beyond quantifying inclusion's sizable revenue impact, they also share data from their survey of over 7,700 US consumers on the lasting negative psychological toll exclusion has on retail customers—and why one bad experience can turn someone off a brand forever. We ana...
2024-05-1632 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 233: Eckhart Boehme | Uncovering Hidden Customer Needs: The Power of Jobs to Be DoneWhat if the key to creating truly innovative products and solutions lies at least as much in uncovering the deep emotional and attitudinal needs of your customers as in mastering technology? Eckhart Boehme, founder and managing director of Unipro Solutions, shares his approach to putting Clayton Christensen’s Jobs to Be Done framework into practical use. Eckhart demonstrates how in-depth interviews with customers and their families can reveal the underlying personal experiences, emotions, and desires that truly motivate people to seek out and purchase products or services. With these insights in hand, companies often uncover fundamentally different ne...
2024-05-0233 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 232: Matt Harris | When AI Shifts the Balance of Power to Consumers: Preparing for a New Business RealityMatt Harris, Partner at Bain Capital Ventures, argues that generative AI will soon empower customers in unexpected ways. Consumers, he predicts, will soon use AI tools to continuously discover lower loan rates, higher-yield savings accounts, or more attractive insurance policies. As a result, Matt anticipates a shift in customer-company power dynamics. Imagine, for example, an AI agent able to continuously move your deposits to the highest-yielding savings accounts or refinance your loans to the best available rates with little intervention required from you. Imagine consumer tools for interpreting medical scans and providing a diagnosis to compare to...
2024-04-1829 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 231: Fred Reichheld | Unleashing Earned Growth: The Referral SpectrumDiscover the engine of Earned Growth as Rob Markey and Fred Reichheld, Bain Fellow and "Winning On Purpose” author, hold a working session on how references and referrals significantly contribute to organic growth. Rob and Fred unearth the pivotal role that references and referrals play in propelling Earned Growth. They answer key questions such as: How would you characterize different referral types? What are the best mechanisms for measuring and attributing value to them? How do you navigate the tricky path of fostering genuine, organic referrals at scale? Together, they explore one of the thorniest is...
2024-04-0435 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 230: Tim Pernetti | A New Playbook: Reinventing the IMG Academy ExperienceWhy would a world-class sports academy invest in a student center, rather than more coaches, fancy equipment, or dorms? IMG Academy, a Florida boarding school, turns out some of the most successful college and professional athletes around. Its president, Tim Pernetti, led a massive cultural shift toward customer loyalty. Tim says IMG Academy used to be highly focused on coaching and sports operations. To be clear, that emphasis on athletic excellence helped produce a large number of highly successful athletes. But Tim and the leadership team saw the potential to add something on top of...
2024-03-2138 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 229: Stan Swinton | Redefining Customer Centricity: What is the NPSx Framework?How can businesses transcend traditional customer service boundaries to establish new customer experience benchmarks? Stan Swinton, Founder and General Manager of NPSx, Bain & Company, discusses how a comprehensive approach to customer experience extends beyond gathering feedback or managing customer journeys. Stan details Bain’s NPSx framework—comparable to a restaurant star rating, he says—which offers an extensive customer-centricity analysis via 60+ dimensions and eight pillars. Stan shares how this methodology motivates companies to strive for top-tier customer satisfaction. We also discuss the Customer Experience Roadmap and Accreditation (CXRA). Stan highlights CXRA's effectiveness in uncove...
2024-03-0724 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 228: Tony Ezell | Sustaining Success: How Customer Loyalty Drives Organizational StabilityHow does a global medical technology company maintain customer focus while managing operational challenges during a pandemic? In this episode, Tony Ezell, executive vice president of North America and chief marketing officer for Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD), explores how integrating customer feedback into your business strategy can maintain—and even enhance—customer loyalty by helping shape business strategies that are both robust and responsive to evolving customer needs. Tony outlines how customer loyalty and adaptability are essential strategic tools in healthcare innovation. Together, we explore how BD leveraged a customer-centric approach to skillfully navigate oper...
2024-02-2228 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 227: Richard Watts | “Would You Do That to Your Mum?” The Simple and Powerful CX Litmus TestHow does an insurance industry leader integrate a simple yet profound question—Would you do that to your mom?—to transform customer service and decision making? In this episode, Richard Watts, board member at Farmers Insurance and former sales and service president at Progressive, discusses how asking this question improves business operations. He explores how this unique approach revolutionizes customer service and sets a new industry standard for empathy and customer focus. Richard also shares insights into how this philosophy transformed internal practices, significantly influenced customer satisfaction and loyalty, and how it continues to shape his leadership and...
2024-02-0834 min
The Delighted Customers Podcast with Mark SlatinRob Markey on Building Consistent Loyalty Through Trust and Emotional Connection, Part 2 of 2What are some of the most common mistakes that leaders make when it comes to customer loyalty? Join customer and employee loyalty expert, NPS co-inventor, co-author of The Ultimate Question 2.0, and world renown CX thought leader, Rob Markey in Part 2 of our conversation on value, loyalty, and loyalty programs. In this episode: - Common loyalty pitfalls - The impact of broken trust on loyalty - Where Southwest and Delta Airlines misstepped and broke loyalty - Link between rational, experiential, and emotional aspects of customer evaluation - How the three lens we use to assess value work together If you ha...
2024-01-1115 min
The Delighted Customers Podcast with Mark SlatinThe 3 Dimensions of Customer Value Creation with NPS Co-Inventor, Rob Markey, Part 1 of 2The Three Dimensions of Customer Value Creation Rob Markey ought to know a thing or two about customer loyalty. Rob was a CX expert and thought leader at Bain long before he and his colleague Fred Reichheld introduced Net Promoter to the world. He is a leader in Bain's Customer Customer Strategy and Marketing practice and the co-author of The Ultimate Question 2.0 with Fred Reichheld. This episode was originally intended as a deep dive on customer loyalty through the customer lifecycle for my Michigan State Un...
2024-01-0438 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 226: Ruth Veloria | Purpose-Driven Progress: Helping University of Phoenix Students SucceedHow do the needs of students at for-profit, mostly online colleges differ from those of typical college students? They often require financial aid, schedule flexibility, and academic support that can go far beyond the norm of traditional higher education. In this segment, we explore why graduation rates have traditionally been quite low at these colleges due to all the challenges students face. How do schools like this strike an appropriate balance of flexibility, support, and rigorous academic programs that will help their students succeed in the workforce? Ruth Veloria is the chief strategy officer and customer officer...
2024-01-0431 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 225: Jason Barro | Trapped: The Hidden Forces Behind Counterintuitive NPS ResultsHow do high-quality NPS benchmarks unlock strategic priorities and initiatives? What if your NPS data seems highly counterintuitive? For example, what if Detractors seem to be more loyal than Promoters? Host Rob Markey and Jason Barro, a partner at Bain & Company and the leader of Bain's NPS Prism benchmarking service, unpack this situation in the airline industry. It’s an illustration of how Net Promoter Score benchmark data might be misleading when not all customers have the freedom to choose, revealing the nuanced understanding required to transform raw data into strategic business insights. Jason and Ro...
2023-12-2133 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 224: Conny Kalcher | Stackable Strategies: Adapting an Iconic Toymaker’s Customer-Centricity to Zurich InsuranceFrom reshaping the playful culture of a global toy company to cracking the customer-centricity code at Zurich Insurance, how did Conny Kalcher manage the leap? Conny Kalcher, now the group chief customer officer at Zurich Insurance, has a rich history of pioneering customer-centric transformations. Conny introduced a swath of fresh perspectives and approaches to the more traditional environment of Zurich Insurance. She did this not long after retiring from a rewarding career at LEGO, where she helped a customer-centric transformation. Her influence transcends the boundaries of any one company, partly a result of her active participation in...
2023-11-1636 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 223: Mark Slatin | The Trust Equation: How to Build Intimate Customer RelationshipsHost Rob Markey welcomes Mark Slatin, CEO of EmpoweredCX, to dissect the intricate dynamics of trust within customer experiences. Drawing insights from real-world examples, they explore the role of product and service quality in establishing trust, the impact of reliability and consistency in decision making, and the potential pitfalls of self-orientation. Delving deeper into the Trust Equation and explaining its different facets, Mark underscores the necessity of understanding the customer’s journey and perspective. They address the challenges of reliability, targeted marketing implications, customer vs. company centricity, the art of meaningful recommendations, and more. And they explore how to ba...
2023-10-2632 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 222: Fred Reichheld | Measuring Customer Loyalty: The Journey from Retention to Net Promoter to Earned GrowthIn this episode, we launch our new show name: The Customer Confidential Podcast. We chose it after seeking lots of listener and guest input and believe that the new name better reflects the show’s mission—namely, to delve into untold stories of customer and industry transformations, sharing the journeys of both well-known and unsung heroes of customer centricity. We also seek out deep conversations with the thought leaders who inspire the best practitioners. Also, in this episode, which also marks our 10th anniversary, host Rob Markey welcomes back frequent guest (and Rob’s longtime mentor) Fred Reichhe...
2023-10-1234 min
The Delighted Customers Podcast with Mark SlatinPt. 2 - Measuring and Managing Customer Loyalty in a Digital World with Rob Markey, Bain & Co.Part 2 of 2 Predictive NPS - How Loyalty Measurement is Changing with Rob Markey A powerful, insightful, revealing interview so packed with gems that I had to break it into two parts! Rob Markey is the Co-Inventor of the Net Promoter System and the Co-Author of The Ultimate Question 2.0. In Part 2 (this episode): We discuss: Rob’s definition of customer experience The impact of digital transformation on CX Why and how NPS will still pl...
2023-01-1245 min
The Delighted Customers Podcast with Mark SlatinPt. 1 - The Room Where It Happened: The Net Promoter Backstory with Rob Markey, Bain & Co.Rob Markey on the Delighted Customers Podcast Part 1 of 2 What would you expect from one of the top CX thought leaders in the world? A powerful, insightful, revealing interview so packed with gems that I had to break it into two parts! Rob Markey is the Co-Inventor of the Net Promoter System and the Co-Author of The Ultimate Question 2.0. In Part 1 (this episode): We discuss: Loyalty levers to pull in a down economy How loyalty leaders can excel in a recession Why Rob initially rejected a single q...
2023-01-0530 min
Breakthrough BuildersOn Loyalty: Rob MarkeyRob Markey is the co-creator of the now-ubiquitous Net Promoter System—borrowing from Churchill, he refers to it as “the worst customer loyalty metric, except for all the others that have been tried.” But because of his accountability to clients and colleagues, Rob has higher expectations than many: Through 30+ years at Bain he’s passionately championed the sometimes-unfulfilled mission behind the system—to put the customer at the center of business decisions and operations, at scale.In his conversation with Jesse, you'll hear about how Rob found his way to consulting; what he thinks makes him an effective...
2022-10-1239 min
Spark PlugRob Markey, Bain & CompanyRob Markey is a partner in Bain & Company’s New York office and a leader in the firm’s Customer Strategy & Marketing practice. Rob leads the NPS Loyalty Forum and is broadly credited as the co-inventor of the Net Promoter Score (NPS). He is an expert in customer experience and loyalty, new product development, and customer service strategies. He is the co-author of The Ultimate Question 2.0: How Net Promoter Companies Thrive in a Customer-Driven World.Thanks for listening to Spark Plug -- find all our episodes at Sparkplug.audioSpark Plug is brou...
2022-03-0435 min
Success FundamentalsControl What You Can Control with Rob MarkeyIn this episode, Kris Sykes and Brian Goldsack talk to Rob Markey, co-creator of the Net Promoter Score, a tool widely used in interpreting customer loyalty. Rob has spent his professional career studying customer experience and loyalty and has deep insight into how customer feedback can directly improve a company’s products, services, and value. Rob’s ideas put the customers back into the center of doing business: a concept that isn’t new, but was sidelined when businesses grew from the hands of artisans to corporations during the industrial revolution. HIGHLIGHTSBusiness metrics vs real value c...
2022-01-1551 min
Let's Talk Loyalty#146: Loyalty Leadership with Bain & Company's Rob Markey (Short Show Summary)Rob Markey is the one of the world's leading authorities on customer loyalty. Together with Fred Reichheld, he co-created The Net Promoter System®, the industry metric and framework now used by more than two thirds of Fortune 1000 companies.This short summary episode reminds us of the importance of the "founder's mindset" as a key driver of loyalty, as well as Rob's latest work to develop increasingly robust models for customer lifetime value that can be share externally with investors as well as internally. Rob shares the view that loyalty professionals are really the per...
2021-09-2708 min
Doing Customer Experience Right with Stacy ShermanMeasuring Customer Loyalty (NPS and Beyond) Featuring Rob MarkeyNet Promoter (NPS) is a popular way to gauge whether your customers are brand advocates (promoters) or dissatisfied (Detractors). Rob Markey, co-founder of the Net Promoter System at Bain, and Stacy Sherman discuss the meaning and evolution of NPS, misperceptions, and ultimate questions to measure customer satisfaction. You'll gain actionable tips to maximize customer loyalty and referrals the right way! Learn more about guest Rob Markey and host Stacy Sherman at: . Access our FREE Customer Experience Audit Tool: Grow as a CX Professional with our numerous Book time with Stacy .
2021-07-1627 min
the auditionhacker podcast004 - audition feast and famine with jim markeyon one hand, the boston symphony's jim markey has had an objectively amazing career. he's held a handful major american jobs:
pittsburgh symphony principal trombonist,
NY philharmonic associate principal trombonist,
NY phil bass trombonist,
and his current job, bass trombonist with the bso.
but it wasn't always like that. just like the rest of us, jim has struggled through disappointment and negative audition results.
...there was the one time when he peaked too soon for the north carolina audition.
...or the time when the LA phil audition "just didn't feel right" and he...
2021-01-171h 05
Rob Smith, Jr. - Rob’s Right!Rob’s Right Podcast: Massachusetts Kennedy conceding to incumbent Markey is a big deal! Here’s why!I explore the defeat of Kennedy and those who supported he and Markey and what that may tell us about November results.
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2020-09-0213 min
Let's Talk Loyalty#42: Loyalty Leadership using NPS and Customer Lifetime Value - with Rob Markey, Bain & CompanyAs the founder of Bain & Company's Customer practice, Rob Markey is the one of the world's leading authorities on customer loyalty, having co-created The Net Promoter System® - the industry metric and framework now used by more than two thirds of Fortune 1000 companies. Rob co-authored the best-selling book "The Ultimate Question 2.0" with Fred Reichheld, and he is now a keynote speaker, leader of the NPS Loyalty Forum and a podcaster on customer and employee experience. In this episode of Let's Talk Loyalty, we discuss the insights that led to the development of the NPS framework as o...
2020-07-0158 min
The Remarkable Leadership PodcastCreating Customer Value with Rob MarkeyWe have the tools for accounting principles, and these have remained unchanged for years. Yet we have no real tool to measure customer loyalty, and every bit of cash flow starts with cash from the customer’s pocket. Kevin is joined by Rob Markey. He is the author of a new Harvard Business Review article on how to run a company to maximize customer value, “Are You Undervaluing Your Customers?" He is also the co-author of The Ultimate Question 2.0. Rob believes that customer loyalty and company success go hand in hand. Companies with high satisfaction rankings grow revenues roughly 2.5 time...
2020-05-2038 min
On Brand with Nick WestergaardBuilding Brand Loyalty Through Customer Listening with Rob Markey“In times of crisis, as leaders, we often want to clamp down—command and control. We go into bunker mode.” However, customer loyalty is best built by closing the distance between a brand's leadership and the front lines of employees and customers, explains Rob Markey of Bain & Company. We discussed all of this and more on this week’s episode of the On Brand podcast.About Rob MarkeyRob Markey is a partner in Bain & Company’s New York office and a leader in the firm’s Customer Strategy & Marketing practice. He is an expert in customer...
2020-04-2728 min
Christopher Lochhead Follow Your Different™Are You Undervaluing Your Customers? w/ Rob Markey of Bain & Co.We speak with Rob Markey of Bain & Co today about his breakthrough piece for Harvard Business Review “Are You Undervaluing Your Customers?”Rob also leads the Net Promoter Score Loyalty Forum and his Firm, Bain, invented the Net Promoter Score (NPS).
We have a riveting conversation about why companies with high levels of customer loyalty grow 2.5 times as fast as their peers, how companies should re-orient around customers and why Customer Loyalty is a shareholder priority and more. If you care about customers and growth, I think you’re going to love this dialogue.
Pressure To Deliver Earnings
Rob shares how hi...
2020-03-3042 min
Helping Sells Radio175 Rob Markey The New Customer MetricsRob Markey, Bain & Co partner, author of "The Ultimate Question 2.0," and co-creator of the Net Promoter System (NPS) has a new Harvard Business Review article out. It’s called, “Are you undervaluing your customers?” I think this is the right question to ask. After all, the purpose of a business is to create and keep customers, says Peter Drucker. Yet, too often we get caught up in other pursuits…bookings, billings, revenue, earnings per share, churn, health scores, comp plans, reorgs, endless arguments over who owns the customer experience. I could go on, but I will spare you. This is not a dig. It...
2020-03-2152 min
Amazing Business RadioCustomer Value is Company Value Featuring Rob MarkeyTop Takeaways:- NPS refers not only to the Net Promoter Score, but also to a system that is a set of behaviors, actions and technology that provides customer feedback directly to frontline employees. While the score itself is important, the bigger impact is on frontline employee learning, making customers feel as though their voice is heard and valued.- When asking for customer feedback, model your approach off of NPS and Enterprise Rent-A-Car’s original Service Quality Index: ask a single question with a simple metric, then an open-ended follow-up question (“why?”) and finally, follow up on the feedback yo...
2020-03-1732 min
Michael Covel's Trend FollowingEp. 843: Rob Markey Interview with Michael Covel on Trend Following RadioBain & Company partner Rob Markey argues most companies are too focused on earnings at the expense of customers. Instead they should measure and report “customer value” to investors, like Costco, Amex and Humana do, with consistent metrics that allow investors and other stakeholders to judge a company’s true value compared to competitors. Too often, earnings pressure results in cost-cutting measures that hurt customers. But if you want to compete in today’s loyalty economy, customer value should be reported in your next quarterly and annual earnings or IPO reports, and it should become the focus of the mone...
2020-02-2100 minThe Strategy Skills Podcast: Strategy | Leadership | Critical Thinking | Problem-Solving96: "Are you undervaluing your customers?" with Bain & Company's Rob MarkeyListen to this thought-provoking discussion between Michael and Rob Markey, Bain and Company's partner. Rob Markey, a partner and director at Bain & Company and the founder of the firm’s Global Customer Strategy and Marketing practice. He is a co-author of The Ultimate Question 2.0 and is the host of the Net Promoter System podcast. He is based in New York. https://www.firmsconsulting.com/
2020-01-141h 09
SparrowCastDifference Between Measuring Your NPS VS. Using The Net Promoter System | Sparrowcast with Rob MarkeyRob Markey, Partner, Bain & Company, speaks at SparrowCast on the difference between measuring your NPS versus using the net promoter system.
2019-11-0608 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 152: Scotiabank’s Ignacio Deschamps | Surviving Year TwoHost Rob Markey and Ignacio 'Nacho' Deschamps, group head of international banking and digital transformation at Scotiabank, discuss the role of the Net Promoter System in culture change. They also explore what Nacho has learned during Net Promoter System journeys at three different banks around the world, including how to survive the wait for results to catch up to investment during year two.
2019-03-1425 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 151: Scotiabank's Ignacio Deschamps | The Customer Letter That Shaped a LeaderHost Rob Markey talks to Ignacio 'Nacho' Deschamps, Group Head of International Banking and Digital Transformation at Scotiabank, who explains why he has long put customers and technology at the heart of his career in banking and describes how many of Scotiabank’s digital efforts are developed locally and then shared internationally throughout the bank.
2019-03-0735 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 145: 1-800-GOT-JUNK’s Brian Scudamore | A Shining Example of Memorable ServiceHost Rob Markey talks to Brian Scudamore, the founder and CEO of 1-800-GOT-JUNK, whose rubbish hauling business started as a way to pay for college and grew into an international franchise. Brian discusses how the company’s commitment to customer service helped set it apart from competitors and what it takes to maintain service standards in a growing business.
2018-12-0649 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 144: Citizens Bank's Beth Johnson | First Customers, Then GrowthBig things have been happening at Citizens Financial Group, the New England-based financial services company. After spending 26 years as part of the Royal Bank of Scotland, the company returned to the public market in a 2014 initial offering that raised $3 billion. And the bank has been undergoing a multiyear turnaround effort that has put customers at the center of its business. In this episode, Rob Markey talks to Beth Johnson, chief marketing officer and head of virtual channels for Citizens Bank. She has been a key player in these efforts since she joined the company in 2013.
2018-11-3042 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 143: Bain's Gerard du Toit | The Customer Experience Tools Companies LoveHost Rob Markey talks to Bain Partner Gerard du Toit. His team recently asked hundreds of executives if they've adopted 20 of the most popular customer experience tools, and more importantly, whether they're happy with the results. While customer experience tools are not a panacea, they do form an arsenal with which companies can arm themselves to compete. Gerard also discusses the results and other emerging trends in customer experience.
2018-11-0847 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 142: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | The Empathy Remedy in HealthcareMedical 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.
2018-10-2634 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 141: Jeanne Bliss of CustomerBliss | It’s Still About Humans Helping HumansHost 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.
2018-10-1145 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 140: Comcast’s Charlie Herrin | How Follow-up Calls Can Inspire ChangeFollow-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 dri...
2018-09-2030 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 139: Comcast’s Charlie Herrin | Inside a Cable Giant’s Net Promoter TurnaroundCable 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.
2018-09-0650 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 138: USAA's Julio Estevez-Breton | The Customer Experience-Based OrganizationUSAA, 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...
2018-07-2750 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 137: FirstService's Charlie Chase | The Business Lessons of RejectionRob 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.
2018-07-1358 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 136: Elwood Staffing's Fernando Cadena | Building Temporary Relationships That LastRob 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.
2018-06-2845 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 135: Year Up's Garrett Warfield and Jess Britt | Fostering a Feedback CultureYear 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 Jes...
2018-06-1452 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 133: Bain's Jason Barro | The Roadmap to LeadershipWhen 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.
2018-05-2339 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 132: Boxed's Jackson Jeyanayagam | Using Service to Take on Retail's Big NamesRob Markey talks to Jackson Jeyanayagam, chief marketing officer at Boxed, an online grocery startup that's taking on traditional wholesalers by offering personalized service and convenient delivery. Jackson joined the company in 2016 after overseeing digital marketing at Chipotle Mexican Grill.
2018-04-2739 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 131: Adidas' Celine Del Genes | Designing the Glitch ExperienceHost Rob Markey talks to Celine Del Genes, vice president, concept to consumer, for Adidas Football. She oversees the sports apparel company’s go-to-market strategy for soccer shoes and gear, managing key decisions about pricing, sales channels and marketing approaches. Celine is also a Net Promoter practitioner and uses the method to gauge customer reaction to company initiatives and product design. She recently brought together social marketing, agile decision-making and Net Promoter feedback in an innovative campaign to promote Adidas' Glitch soccer cleat.
2018-04-1342 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 130: Bain's Jeff Melton | The Metrics That Matter MostRob Markey talks to Bain Partner Jeff Melton, co-leader of Bain Simple & Digital, an approach that helps companies apply digital technology where it matters. Jeff discusses the importance of choosing the right metrics to gauge a customer episode and what happens when companies choose the wrong ones.
2018-03-2345 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 129: Dell's Marc Stein | Bringing Net Promoter to ScaleDell has been collecting customer feedback since Michael Dell dropped out of college three decades ago and founded the company. It's part of the company's DNA. The computer maker began its Net Promoter journey a decade ago when it was trying to connect customer satisfaction with economic outcomes. Now the company has a robust Net Promoter System that informs major projects and innovations. In this episode, host Rob Markey catches up with Marc Stein, senior vice president of customer experience at Dell. Marc discusses how the company’s comprehensive Net Promoter System has evolved since De...
2018-03-0134 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 128: FireDisc's Griff and Hunter Jaggard | Stoking the Entrepreneurial SpiritRob Markey welcomes Griff and Hunter Jaggard, the brothers behind the FireDisc, a portable propane cooking surface that has become required gear among outdoor enthusiasts. They launched their company in 2010 with a tractor plow disc and an idea inspired by their Texas childhoods, and they have been using Net Promoter to help guide their efforts.
2018-02-0838 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 127: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | Boning Up on Behavioral EconomicsWhen responding to an angry customer, few words are as effective as "I'm sorry." And yet, it's so hard for some people to apologize sincerely. Why? In this episode, host Rob Markey welcomes back Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System. Together, Rob and Maurice will discuss how behavioral economics can inform companies' interactions with customers and how they use the Net Promoter System.
2018-01-1126 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 126: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | Are Cultural Differences at Play?How does a customer's country of origin affect the feedback they provide about service experiences? Are certain countries home to naturally tough critics? Do people in some countries view rating scales differently? Cultural differences play a role in Net Promoter feedback, but to a far lesser degree than many practitioners assume. The challenge is to separate cultural issues from real service problems. In this episode, host Rob Markey welcomes back Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System. Together, Rob and Maurice will take on...
2017-12-1419 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 125: Darci Darnell | Bringing Net Promoter to the PeopleDespite companies’ best efforts to engage their teams, more than half of employees say they are uninspired and dissatisfied in their roles, according to Bain research. Only 19% of employees say they’re inspired and satisfied—a huge opportunity for companies that learn to tap their teams’ potential. We’ve spent the last several years studying companies’ best engagement methods and distilling them into a simple approach that other companies could adopt to get their employees’ best. We call it Net Promoter for People. In this episode, host Rob Markey welcomes Darci Darnell, who leads Bain’s Customer Strat...
2017-11-3035 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 124: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | Rallying Teams Around Net PromoterBuilding internal support for a fledgling Net Promoter System can be one of the biggest challenges of getting such an effort off the ground. It requires leaders to not only have a strong grasp of loyalty economics and the company's strategy, but the softer skills necessary to inspire and teach employees to do the right thing for customers. In this episode, host Rob Markey welcomes back Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System. Together, Rob and Maurice will discuss how companies can rally their employees ar...
2017-11-1617 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 123: Michael Farmer | Inside Madison Avenue's Loyalty ChallengeNo industry has escaped the disruption of digital technology. Advertising is no exception. Ad agencies, which previously thrived in what was once a loyalty-based industry, are now facing new competition as they struggle to hold on to client relationships. Advertising fee structures have also changed, along with customer expectations. In this episode, host Rob Markey talks to advertising industry expert Michael Farmer, author of Madison Avenue Manslaughter: An Inside View of Fee-Cutting Clients, Profit-Hungry Owners and Declining Ad Agencies. His firm, Farmer & Co., advises advertising agencies on business strategy, giving him a front-row seat to...
2017-11-0237 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 122: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | The Net Promoter Games People PlayBegging customers for strong scores. Only seeking feedback from customers who had positive outcomes. Altering contact information to make dissatisfied customers hard to reach. When it comes to gaming the Net Promoter System, we've seen it all and one thing is always clear: When employees intentionally undermine a company's efforts to understand customers and improve service, everyone loses. In this episode, Rob Markey welcome back Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System. Together, they discuss ways that companies can discourage employees from sabotaging th...
2017-10-1925 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 121: Aisling Hassell | Unlocking Airbnb's Culture of TrustAirbnb launched 10 years ago when roommates Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia decided to rent out an air mattress on the floor of their San Francisco living room to make a few extra bucks. Now it's a $31 billion hospitality giant that has created a whole new category of lodging. Airbnb's unique business model, which allows people in more than 190 countries to rent their homes to travelers, requires a high level of trust among not only guests and hosts, but also employees and managers. The company has gone to great lengths to infuse that sense of trust, inside and...
2017-10-0540 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 120: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | Why Response Rates MatterThe statistical validity of the Net Promoter Score depends on response rates; the higher the rate, the greater the accuracy. Low response rates can easily undermine a company's Net Promoter System, causing leaders to overlook burgeoning problems or wrongly assume that customers are happy. In this episode, host Rob Markey and Maurice FitzGerald, retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implement the System, tackle common questions about response rates. Learn more: Creating a Reliable Metric
2017-09-2127 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 118: Q&A with Maurice FitzGerald | What's in a Benchmark?What does it take to develop meaningful competitive benchmark Net Promoter Scores? What is the relationship between benchmark trends and revenue? What if your company is small or operates in a niche industry with few competitors for comparison? Competitive benchmark Net Promoter Scores provide an objective and fair basis for comparing your company’s feedback to the feedback your competitors earn. Done right, they can provide the basis for goal setting and prioritization at the highest levels of a company. However, calculating a sound benchmark score can be challenging and complex. In this episode, Rob Ma...
2017-08-2430 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 115: Maurice FitzGerald | Tackling Net Promoter Questions from Practitioners on LinkedInWhat if a company wants to adopt the Net Promoter System, but lacks the resources and time to fully implement each aspect of the framework? Is something better than nothing? In this episode, Rob Markey welcomes back Maurice FitzGerald, the retired vice president of customer experience at HP Software and author of Net Promoter—Implementing the System. Together, Rob and Maurice will tackle this question and others submitted by members of the Net Promoter System Forum on LinkedIn, a group for Net Promoter practitioners that Maurice manages. The Net Promoter System continues to evolve and im...
2017-07-1351 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 114: Fred Debruyne | The Secret to Happier Customers? Think Simple and DigitalTelecom executives are under pressure from their customers, shareholders and other stakeholders to become more digital, to exploit the new technologies and opportunities that will enable them to deliver more services and operate more efficiently. Some companies approach their digital transformation as a series of boxes to be ticked: mobile apps, better web services, more online transactions. But these companies are missing out on an opportunity to reinvent themselves. The most forward-looking executives will take advantage of this pressure not merely to digitalize their companies, but to deliver remarkably better experiences for customers. In thi...
2017-06-2937 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 110: Shorts | The Story Behind the Smiley FaceLong before social media and online surveys, shopkeepers relied on a simple measure of customer sentiment: whether their customers were smiling. In this short episode, Fred Reichheld and Rob Markey share the story behind the Net Promoter System's signature smiley face icons, and discuss how one number can become a powerful learning tool for inspiring lasting change.
2017-04-1302 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 107: Shorts | Asking the Right QuestionBy focusing on a single question, the Net Promoter System eliminates unnecessary complexity. Rob Markey and Fred Reichheld, inventor of the Net Promoter Score, explain the origins of the "likelihood to recommend" question.
2017-03-1603 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 105: Shorts | Going Beyond Statistics with Net PromoterRob Markey discusses how he became a Net Promoter convert with Fred Reichheld, inventor of the Net Promoter Score.
2017-02-2403 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 102: Shorts | The Outer Loop of the Net Promoter SystemThe Net Promoter System's "outer loop" is used to prioritize and address problems that can't be resolved by individuals or small teams. Rob Markey discusses why a robust, rigorous and transparent "outer loop" is essential to a solid Net Promoter System in this short episode. Read more: The Net Promoter System's Outer Loop
2017-01-2603 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 100: Who Makes the Follow-Up Call? Rob Markey Answers More Listener QuestionsDoes the Net Promoter Score gauge a customer's broader relationship with a company or just the customer's most recent experience? Or both? Who should make follow-up calls to customers? Rob Markey addresses these questions and more in this episode.
2017-01-0619 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 99: What's in a Scale? Rob Markey Answers Listeners' QuestionsWhy does the Net Promoter scale go from zero to 10? Why is passive not the same as neutral? Rob Markey answers these questions and others in this episode. Recommended reading: The Benefits of a Competitive Benchmark Net Promoter Score Creating a Reliable Metric
2016-12-1512 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 98: The 33 Qualities of Inspiring LeadersThe goal of the Net Promoter System is to create a culture that encourages employees to bring energy and creativity to their jobs. Developing that kind of culture requires inspiring leaders. We’ve all seen those people who seem born to be leaders. They have an uncanny knack for motivating the people around them. They show gratitude and connect with people in authentic ways. You might chalk it up to charisma or a rare innate gift. While that might be true, it’s possible that they studied their own behavior and learned how to mobilize the be...
2016-12-0842 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 97: Shorts - Huddles in the Net Promoter SystemThe team huddle is the part of the Net Promoter System that connects the inner loop to the outer loop. Rob Markey discusses why regular get-togethers—often daily or weekly—are a critical element of the system. Read more: The Net Promoter System's "Huddle": How Employees Come Together to Focus on Customers and Teamwork
2016-12-0203 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 96: What Really Motivates PeopleIt’s a question just about every manager wrestles with: How do I get my employees to do what I want them to do? How do I get them to be more empathetic to customers? To take feedback and make meaningful changes? Obviously, fair pay is essential, but there’s far more to it. After all, motivating people requires tapping into deep emotional needs for autonomy, purpose and affiliation. In this episode, Rob Markey talks to Daniel Pink, author of the 2011 best-seller Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. In the book, Daniel breaks down...
2016-11-1838 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 95: Rob Markey Answers Listeners' Net Promoter System QuestionsThe Net Promoter Score is a simple measure, but building a process and culture that results in deep customer relationships can be very complex. In this episode, Rob Markey answers listeners' questions on everything from competitive benchmarks to best practices for following up with customers. Do you have a question for Rob? Feel free to tweet your question to @rgmarkey on Twitter or write it in the comments field on any post on the Net Promoter System blog.
2016-11-1019 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 94: Shorts - The Inner Loop of the Net Promoter SystemThe Net Promoter System has a mechanism called the inner loop that helps employees of all kinds get real-time feedback directly from customers. The feedback is usually positive—most employees do their job pretty well—so people typically become more engaged and enthusiastic. The occasional criticism or complaint about a specific interaction or decision can help individual employees and the organization learn to do their jobs better. The challenge is to set up the inner loop in the right way, so that it reinforces learning rather than undermining it. In this short episode, Rob Markey discus...
2016-10-2003 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 92: Shorts - Who Should Run Your Net Promoter System?What qualities and experiences make for a successful chief advocacy officer? Not just anyone will do, regardless of how bright and ambitious he or she may seem to be. The best CAOs aren’t always the people you might think of first, and they aren’t always working in predictable roles. But one thing is for sure: It's important to choose someone who has the respect of the organization's leaders. In this short episode, Rob Markey discusses some critical considerations for companies that are choosing a CAO. Learn more: Who Should Run Your Net...
2016-10-0603 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 90: Shorts - The Essential Role of the Customer Advocacy OfficeIn this short episode of the Net Promoter System Podcast, Rob Markey explains how a customer advocacy office, or CAO, can be a focal point for learning about—and improving—the customer experience. A customer advocacy office can serve as the project management office that coordinates product development, marketing and other functional groups in the organization to focus on the customer experience. Net Promoter provides the methodology and the tools; the CAO is the arm of management that puts the methods and tools to work. Learn more: The Essential Role of the Customer Advocacy Office
2016-09-0803 minCustomer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned GrowthEp. 89: Shorts - Get Real Feedback from Your B2B CustomersMost companies that serve other companies solicit feedback, often in the form of quarterly or semiannual satisfaction surveys. The Net Promoter System in a B2B setting also solicits feedback from customers. But that’s where the similarity to conventional methodologies ends. This system’s twin goals are to foster customer engagement and build strong client relationships. It isn’t so much a survey method as a means of facilitating relationship-enhancing conversations. It helps sales reps and account managers get involved in solving customers’ problems. It shows marketers and product designers and service engineers ways to make the cust...
2016-08-2504 min