Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING FEB 2019 56 – a tangible, visual document that lays out where and how your customers interact with your business. It is an information-laden visual document that makes the customer-company relationship and the customer experience crystal clear. Once the current-state blueprints are designed, management needs to assess which touchpoints (points of interaction between the provider and customer) need fixing. After fixing the “fail points” management can direct its attention to creating touchpoints that offer superior value to customers in a way that cannot be easily duplicated by competitors. Of all the methodologies for enhancing CX, blueprints have proved to the most effective. Currently, three of the six major casino operators in Macau are using service blueprints to positive effect. VoC INITIATIVES Voice of the Customer (VoC) is a term that describes your customers’ feedback about their experiences with and expectations of your products or services. I have seen VoC initiatives scuttled at some prominent properties in Macau because management convinces itself that the company offers the best CX to their customers or because management feels that customers will be offended if their feedback on CX is asked for. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The sole judge of customer experience quality is the customer. VoC initiatives are therefore indispensable for monitoring the customer experience. Typical VoC methods include traditional means such as Call Center transcripts, customer satisfaction surveys and focus groups as well as some recent revolutionary methods such as Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET) and use of AI for data analysis and prediction of customer behavior. To summarize, CX will be the key differentiator between successful and not-so-successful casino operators in Macau and Asia. Companies aspiring to be in the former category are urged to engage in service blueprinting and VoC initiatives. COLUMNISTS