PSPINC Official Company Blog

Marketing professionals have always known giving customers the best experience possible is important, and that it refers to the entire customer journey rather than ending after making the purchase. Delivering great experiences has only become that much more important. Businesses have the opportunity to maintain and strengthen relationships with customers at every step of the customer journey by building trust.

Building strong relationships between your business and your customers starts with creating exceptional customer experiences. And with so much of our interactions with brands online, customer experiences can make or break a business. According to a report from Salesforce, 79% of customers agree that the experience is just as important as the product or service a company sells. So, prioritizing customer experiences is a necessity today to stand out amongst competitors.

While it’s easy to say how important prioritizing customer experiences is, it’s another to put that into action. A few ways you can do that include:

Exceed expectations

When you give customers what they expect, it’ll satisfy them. It’s when things unexpectedly go wrong when they aren’t happy. But if you can give them more than they expect like adding a welcome gift, thank you card, or even just standout customer service, they’ll be thrilled. When people feel the love, they’ll return the favor by coming back for their next purchase or even recommending your brand to others.

Ask for, listen to, and act on feedback

We’ve explained before why asking for customer feedback is important, and doing so in the form of reviews or some kind of rating system makes it easy. But just asking for feedback means nothing if you don’t do anything about it.

People want to feel heard, and reviews and ratings hold a lot of weight on your business because of how heavily potential customers rely on them. From a business perspective, it’s also important to constantly try to improve your business. With these ratings and reviews being directly about your product, this is the easiest way to do so.

Reward loyalty

There’s a reason loyalty programs work: they build trust and increase customer retention. But there’s an easy way to reward customers’ loyalty as opposed to building a whole program around it. You can reward people with small things like reposting user-generated content with a thank you attached or offering exclusive discounts to show your appreciation.

Prioritizing customer experiences doesn’t just build trust between your business and your customers, but it is also much more cost-effective and less time-consuming compared to trying to obtain new customers. It also results in happier customers, which will result in good customer reviews. And if they really like their experience, it’s possible they’ll become brand advocates, where they’ll market for you by recommending your business to their friends, families, and/or online followers.

So, it’s clear that businesses shouldn’t just consider customers’ experiences, but they should make it a vital part of their marketing strategy. It’s often an overlooked part of the process, but it pays off in the end to make it the best it can be. The reality is that customers are constantly interacting with the brand, even if it isn’t directly with your customer support people. They’re scrolling past ads on social media, watching an influencer promote a product on YouTube, or checking out your Instagram page. So, use that to your advantage by making sure every interaction your business has with customers will keep them coming back.

Last year, Adobe, the company behind the invention of the PDF and popular programs like Photoshop and Illustrator, announced its plan of acquiring the cloud-based design tool, Figma, for $20 billion. One that even our web designers use here at PSPINC. Adobe has a history of acquiring more than 50 companies in its 40-plus years of existence. So, if this is so standard for Adobe, why are people making such a big deal out of it? For starters, this is the most money Adobe’s ever spent in acquiring a company. About four times more. Their second largest acquisition behind Figma was Marketo in 2018 for $4.75 billion. So, the real question is, why is Adobe investing so much in buying out Figma?

Adobe has a rich history of acquiring companies and either adopting them as their own or letting them slowly die out. For example, Photoshop is arguably the most lucrative acquisition deal Adobe’s ever made. They purchased Photoshop for $34.5 million in 1995, right when computer technology and digital photography technology advanced. But Adobe has also bought out companies just to eliminate the competition slowly. An example would be FreeHand. And there’s a reason you probably don’t recognize the name. Adobe acquired FreeHand in 1994 for $525 million and by 2007, Adobe announced the end of FreeHand.

 

Figma, as of June 2021, has a valuation of $10 billion, but because Adobe sees the value in it, they offered double the amount. And it’s for a good reason; Figma allows for greater collaboration between designers. And it’s something Adobe hasn’t figured out how to do effectively yet. While Adobe has the Adobe Creative Cloud, many designers have expressed their frustration with its lack of collaboration features. Figma, however, has browser functionality, which is something Adobe doesn’t have with any of its design products. Including the program they created to directly competed with Figma, Adobe XD.

Because of Adobe’s history of products like FirstHand, Figma users are worried about what Adobe will do to what’s become an essential design tool. One of those worries includes making Figma a paid tool rather than a free one. The fact that Adobe’s offer is double Figma’s value speaks volumes, and it has the potential to create a big impact in the SaaS (Software as a Service) industry. Unfortunately, the Adobe-Figma deal is now facing anti-competition concerns. EU authorities are pushing for a formal investigation. And the U.S. Justice Department is preparing an antitrust lawsuit, which, if successful, would effectively block this deal. So, only time will tell how this will pan out.

 

Adobe and Figma have reached a mutual agreement to terminate their merger agreement after facing pressure from regulators.