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On this episode, we ask big questions about how customer loyalty is formed — and how AI can be leveraged to build stronger connections with customers.

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What does customer loyalty look like in the age of AI?

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Explore the transformative potential of Contact Center-as-a-Service (CCaaS) solutions and learn how to navigate the evolving landscape of AI-driven customer interactions with this executive brief from Frost & Sullivan.

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The CCaaS breakthrough: Redefining customer interactions with AI

Discover how TELUS Digital transformed customer support for a leading cryptocurrency platform, scaling the program within weeks while achieving high customer satisfaction scores.

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Elevating the customer experience for a leading cryptocurrency platform

The eCommerce checkout is the most overlooked part of the customer journey. Here are four of the biggest customer pain points, and tips on how to solve them.

e-commerce checkout CX

How is your mobile and web checkout affecting your customer experience?

Join Ajinkya Malasane, senior director, product strategy and marketing for TELUS Digital (formerly TELUS International), and Vikram Chatterji, co-founder and CEO of Galileo, a generative AI (GenAI) evaluation company, as they provide efficient and effective ways to solve key GenAI project blockers for easier deployments.

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Crafting production-grade GenAI applications

Robert Zirk: In every episode of Questions for now, I ask influential thought leaders big questions.

Today, several of our previous guests will be asking the big questions to you, the listener.

During our previous recordings, we asked our guests to share one question that anyone listening needs to consider to elevate their CX strategy. These questions were compiled separately in no particular order from the full episodes, so what you're about to hear are brand new insights that also look back at some of our most impactful recent episodes.

So today on Questions for now, we ask: What big questions should CX leaders ask to improve customer outcomes?

Welcome to Questions for now, a podcast from TELUS Digital, where we ask today's big questions in digital customer experience. I'm Robert Zirk.

We have eight big questions to explore today, starting with a question from Lori Branton, global vice president of client success at TELUS Digital, from the episode How can you act as a customer experience change agent in your organization? 

Customers have come to expect fast, personalized and seamless experiences. However, a Gartner survey found that the majority of experiences are high effort, with 62% of B2B and B2C customers reporting their inquiries weren't resolved after switching from self-service to assisted service channels.

Lori asks leaders to approach this disconnect by reflecting honestly on the overall experience they deliver and use those insights as a starting point to identify where to improve, with emphasis on ensuring the experience is seamless and low effort for customers.

Lori Branton: Are we truly delivering a seamless and exceptional customer experience for our customers? Looking at that question, it can include things like: Are we evolving our satisfaction and loyalty metrics appropriately?

Are we measuring the appropriate things? Are we enhancing the ease in which customers can interact with us and get the support that they need? So truly understanding that, more and more, that's what customers are looking for is that seamless experience. Are you truly delivering a seamless and exceptional customer experience for your customers?

Robert Zirk: The Gartner survey referenced earlier found that brands who prioritize low effort experiences were more likely to have higher customer satisfaction rates, generate positive word of mouth and retain customers.

Customer retention is necessary to ensure the growth of your customer base is sustainable. When retention efforts result in better experiences for customers, that can serve as a powerful growth engine for businesses — especially in B2B.

Our second question comes from Daphne Costa Lopes, global director of customer success, strategic accounts and solution architecture at HubSpot, from the episode How can brands turn customer success into their second growth engine?

Daphne encourages leaders to focus their activities on creating value for customers, building a mindset of investing in future growth and shared success.

Daphne Costa Lopes: Are we doing today what's going to create the growth of tomorrow? Because growth doesn't happen within this month. Not even within this quarter. Growth is a longer term journey. So what are the things that I need to do today so that my customers grow tomorrow?

Robert Zirk: As Daphne suggests, business growth requires a long-term approach that's flexible and iterative. She cites the importance of three components to an exceptional experience: understanding the needs of customers, creating self service resources that provide value and engaging in strategic conversations with customers that help them achieve their goals.

Question three takes a lot of what we've covered in terms of providing a seamless experience that adds value and layers on the importance of deeply understanding your customer journey. To pose the question, here's Jim Mitchell, vice president of customer experience and digital innovation at TELUS Digital, from the episode How can brands design and deliver seamless customer experiences? 

Jim Mitchell: How can I meet the customer, in the channel of their choice, to solve their issue with low effort in a consistent manner?

I mean, that's really the mantra here. But do I fully understand my organization today where it sits internally and competitively with the customer experience? Competitively is very important. Of course you are always operating within your budget and what you can do, but do I understand where I sit today?

I'll speak quite often to C-level executives in an organization. And yes, they care about that customer experience, but when I ask them how they're sitting competitively, quite often, there's a bit of a question mark there. So do I have a pulse on what the customer is experiencing? How easy is it to do business with us today is a question I would ask myself if I were a CX leader, like really step back and be honest with ourselves about how easy is it and what else can I do and what is my budget for digital transformation?

Robert Zirk: It's no surprise that budget has been top of mind for many of our guests and the CX leaders who listened to our show. Forrester's Budget Planning Guide 2025: Customer Experience highlights that four out of 10 CX leaders expect to increase their investments in CX within the upcoming year at a rate surpassing inflation.

Elevating the customer experience through digital transformation requires strategic investment, but proving the link between CX and a return on investment can be a challenge.

Our fourth question comes from Jeannie Walters, CX expert and CEO of Experience Investigators, from the episode How can leaders win and optimize investment in CX? Jeannie's question stresses the importance of ensuring your appeal for greater budget is viewed as a win-win-win with senior leadership, benefiting your customers, employees, and business goals.

Jeannie Walters: For every dollar that I'm asking for, every dollar invested, how will that reduce friction for our customers? How will that improve the employee experience? How will that deliver for our organizational goals? And get really real about that.

Make sure that you're not telling yourself a story about, you know, “If we get Net Promoter Score up, everybody's going to be happy.” That is one of those indicators. It's not an outcome. And so we need to really get clear on outcomes. So I would ask: what are the real outcomes you want from the budget that is being invested?

Robert Zirk: Indicators can serve to illustrate trends and progress, but when customers describe your brand, they aren't going to cite those same statistics and metrics. Customer outcomes, on the other hand, are customer facing. Speed, convenience and personalization are all things that might prompt a word of mouth conversation.

Jeannie reinforces the need for leaders to look beyond the indicators and ask how those numbers connect with customer-facing outcomes.

Jeannie Walters: As a CX leader, one of the things and the reason I named the company Experience Investigators is because I think we bring curiosity. We have to be curious all the time about “Why are things happening?” So maybe there's something happening on the back end. What do we need to know in order to influence the customer experience that maybe others won't see? And that's the gift that we can bring as curious investigators is really looking at what's really going on here and how can we improve it so that all of these outcomes get better.

Robert Zirk: While your customer experience team no doubt plays a lead role in driving and measuring customer outcomes, their efforts can be hindered if the culture of the entire organization isn't aligned.

To emphasize this point, our fifth question comes from Shep Hyken, keynote speaker and author of I'll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again, from the episode What does customer loyalty look like in the age of AI?

Shep Hyken: What does your culture look like? Does the philosophy of the company, the culture of the company point to the North Star of creating loyalty? Does your culture support the end game that you're trying to achieve, not just your process, not just your system, not just the new technology that you're bringing in, but does the entire company, from the CEO to the most recently hired at the lowest position, understand their role and how it impacts the customer?

And even if their job is 100 percent automated, if their job is behind the scenes and they never interact with the customer, they're probably supporting somebody that is or supporting part of the process.

Robert Zirk: A Gallup study shows a direct link between company culture and customer value. When employees strongly identify with their company's culture, they're nearly three times as likely to take ownership of product or service quality and almost five times as likely to believe they can adapt quickly to customer and market changes.

TELUS Digital has won awards for innovation and excellence while also achieving world-class team member engagement of 78%, as measured by third-party Kincentric, across our approximately 77,000 team members.

Shep Hyken: It's much bigger than just the customer support or experience folks. We talk about creating cultures and getting them customer-focused. My process starts with leadership, defines it and lives and breathes it. Then it's communicated. Then everybody's trained to what their part of it is — and I mean everybody. Some are trained much deeper if they're customer-facing, some are trained on basically what their function is and what their role is with the customer, and then role models: managers, supervisors, and leadership — again, they're the role models and not just, say it needs to happen, but live and breathe it.

You defend the culture. Everybody's job is to make sure everybody stays in alignment with what we're trying to achieve and then celebrate it when it works. So that process or framework sounds pretty simple. And if you've got a company of a hundred, 200, 300 people, it's real easy to put this thing to work. If you've got 30,000 or 50,000 people and I have clients that are that large, it takes years to get that large ship to turn the way we want it to, but it's an effort worth making because guess what? Your competition's doing it and you're going to be playing catch up and keep up if you don't do it yourself.

Robert Zirk: As Shep notes, company leadership needs to foster a culture that places customers first. While many organizations strive to be customer-centric by creating positive experiences that meet customer expectations, that alone isn't enough to be competitive in today's business landscape.

Leaders should seek to go above and beyond customer centricity to build an organization that's “customer-obsessed” which Forrester defines as “putting the customer's needs, desires and satisfaction at the forefront of all business decisions and actions.”

Leaders who are customer-obsessed drive loyalty by developing a deep understanding of their customers, using that understanding to proactively identify customer needs and elevating experiences to exceed expectations.

According to Forrester, only 3% of companies meet the definition of customer-obsessed, so there is opportunity for businesses who can be first in their industry to reach that level.

Our sixth question is from Blake Morgan, customer experience futurist, keynote speaker and author of The 8 Laws of Customer-Focused Leadership from the episode How can you act as a customer experience change agent in your organization? — the same episode Lori Branton appeared on that we referenced earlier.

Blake asks leaders to consider this simple question as a litmus test for customer obsession:

Blake Morgan: How often in your schedule does the word customer come up? I mean, you can literally open your calendar and see if the word customer is in there. Many senior executives don't spend much time flipping burgers next to employees, but that is really where the insight is. Go to your stores, go to your retail locations, go to the contact center. Go to the restaurant where your food is served. That is where the insight is.

And many don't want to get off the treadmill, even though the treadmill might not even be working anymore. It's not effective. Actually, you'll probably get the best insights out in the field. So I would say look at your schedule and make sure at least 10 percent of the time that you're with customers and you're paying attention and you're going to where the work is done.

Robert Zirk: Forrester research indicates that over a 12-year period, customer-obsessed businesses can achieve a potential 700% return on their investment. As we noted earlier, customer obsession begins with building a deep understanding of your customers.

Our penultimate question comes from Colin Shaw, keynote speaker and author of The Intuitive Customer: 7 Imperatives for Moving Your Customer Experience to the Next Level, who, along with Shep Hyken, joined us on the episode What does customer loyalty look like in the age of AI? Colin challenges leaders to look beyond surface level customer data and consider their customer's emotional journey with your brand.

Colin Shaw: What's the emotion you're trying to evoke in your customers?

And let me be clear, I'm not talking about people saying, "Well, I want them to have a positive emotion or a negative emotion." What I'm really talking about here is, what is the specific emotion? So is it trust? Is it cared for? Is it feeling valued? Is it feeling happy? What is it?

Robert Zirk: Let's use trust as an example. In a report from Edelman, 71% of consumers said brand trust matters more now than ever before. And 67% said that the trust they hold in brands increases their likelihood of becoming loyal advocates.

Colin noted that connecting outcomes to customer emotions is fundamental to creating experiences that build customer loyalty.

Colin Shaw: One of the things that I do with boards of companies and management groups, and again, the audience may want to do this themselves, is next meeting, go in and say to people, "We heard this really good question, ‘What's the experience we're trying to deliver? What emotions are we trying to evoke?’ Write down the emotion that we are trying to evoke in our customers." And then get people to read what they put out and I guarantee it's going to be different.

What that shows me is people haven't thought through that question. Once you've understood that, you should then be designing everything, including AI, to deliver that. Simple as that.

To put some numbers on it, because I think numbers are important, we did some work with Maersk Line, who are the largest container shipping company in the world, and the work we did with them basically showed that they should be evoking trust, cared for, and pleased. Once they did that, they improved their Net Promoter Score by 40 points over a 30 month period that led to a 10 percent rise in shipping volumes. There are tangible business results to be had by this. It just takes a different way of thinking.

Robert Zirk: According to Salesforce’s State of the Customer Connected Report, 80% of customers say the experience carries as much weight as the product or service they've purchased. So once you've identified the emotions you want your customers to associate with your brand, it's time to ask a big question from the customer's perspective.

Our last question of eight comes from David Avrin, customer experience speaker, consultant and author of Ridiculously Easy to Do Business With, from the previously highlighted episode How can brands design and deliver seamless customer experiences?, which is also the episode Jim Mitchell featured on.

David shared the most impactful question he's posed in 25 years of conversations with business leaders.

David Avrin: The question is: if your customers could wave a magic wand, what do you think they would want you to do differently? We always say, “If we could wave…” No. If they could wave a magic wand, what would you do differently? And then it makes us step back and say, "What do our customers really want? If they were going to say, 'I wish they would do this. I would love it if I could do this or they would offer this.'” It's not “What do we have capabilities of?” “What do we think our customers want?” is that question.

If they could wave a magic wand — your customers — what would you do differently? And the conversation that comes from that is profound. I mean, I'm always the one that believes, when I lead a strategic session, that the answers are in the room and I just act as a facilitator in that capacity. But I ask those kinds of questions. It's not like, "What do your customers love about you?" No. "What would your customers love, if you would do it, that you don't currently offer?" And the ideas come pouring out.

Everything that you say no to doesn't mean we should say yes, but do you know if there's a critical mass of requests that would justify potential, "I don't know, maybe we could do that? Is that a potential place of expansions? Will our industry probably be offering that in the next two years? Well, if so, what do we need to start doing now to prepare for that or to get a leg up on the competition?”

Robert Zirk: These questions reinforce how important it is to see the experience from the lens of your customer. It can be difficult to get the full picture from a single channel of feedback, so it's important to ensure you're listening and engaging across your channels. Likewise, it's important to ensure that the feedback process for customers is seamless and that you're asking the right questions.

David Avrin: People in business always ask the question, "What do our customers want? What are they likely to buy?" as opposed to "What's changed in their life? What are the other options they have besides us? A more important question is "What would they prefer?"

Some companies are doing some pretty remarkable things, some great innovative programs, expediting process, simplifying things. Identify those things that your customers and your prospects traditionally dislike about your industry. If you can address those better and first, then you gain that competitive advantage, at least for a time period.

Robert Zirk: We've just heard eight important questions CX leaders should be asking themselves about how they can improve customer outcomes.

Thank you to all of the guests who took the time to ask the big questions we heard today. All of the experts you heard on this episode have been guests on recent episodes of Questions for now and you can listen to their full episodes by visiting questionsfornow.com or searching up Questions for now — Compelling perspectives on digital CX anywhere you listen to podcasts.

And if you'd like to hear even more compelling insights from influential leaders in digital customer experience, be sure to hit the follow button on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening to Questions for now so that you can be among the first to hear the newest episodes as soon as they're released.

Thank you so much for listening to Questions for now, a TELUS Digital podcast. I'm Robert Zirk, and until next time, that's all… for now.

On this episode, our expert guests from past episodes each share one big question that customer experience leaders need to ask themselves to deliver better customer outcomes — and explore practical ways to find the answers.

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We’ve revisited some of our most impactful topics and compiled eight of the best questions that you, a CX leader, need to ask yourself to improve your customer experience. Join us as we delve into those questions.

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What big questions should CX leaders ask to improve customer outcomes?

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Watch this recorded webinar from Everest Group and TELUS Digital (formerly TELUS International) for new insights to help you skillfully transform your digital customer experience.

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Robert Zirk: What will your business model look like 10 years from now?

Even if you're still selling a similar product or service, your value proposition may have evolved. And over that span of time, the preferences of your customers most certainly will.

As the adage goes, change is constant. Customer behaviors and expectations are always in flux. And it's up to businesses to keep up.

In a Salesforce survey of more than 6,000 consumers, nearly two thirds of respondents said they expected companies to align with their evolving needs and preferences. And a Microsoft report highlighted that 77% of customers view brands that solicit and implement their feedback more favorably.

Frank And Oak is one of those brands that has strived to adapt to customer behaviors and feedback since it was founded in 2012. Back then, according to their website, the company's mission was to "create an apparel brand that would speak to a new generation of creatives and entrepreneurs," and it initially operated on a monthly membership model as an online-only menswear retailer.

Fast forward to 2024, and a lot has changed.

Nadia Famularo: We went from being menswear only and online-only to having both online and brick-and-mortar, adding a women's line.

Robert Zirk: That's Nadia Famularo, director of operations and customer success at Frank And Oak.

Nadia Famularo: And, over time, as we understood where the market was, where our customers were, what they really wanted evolved into a more kind of an everyday lifestyle brand.

Robert Zirk: Having been with the company in a variety of roles through many of these changes, Nadia shares insights on this episode that are valuable to business and CX leaders across industries, covering data-driven decision-making, gathering and leveraging customer feedback and how technology plays an important role in delivering an effortless customer experience.

So today on Questions for now, we'll ask: What is the Frank and Oak secret for adapting to changing customer preferences?

Robert Zirk: Welcome to Questions for now, a podcast from TELUS Digital where we ask today's big questions in digital customer experience. I'm Robert Zirk.

The Frank And Oak of today is quite different from the company that launched back in 2012. Based out of Montreal, Canada, Frank And Oak began as an online-only menswear retailer with focuses on custom suiting and bespoke tailoring. And it operated on a membership model where customers could choose three articles of clothing that were thematically designed in-house. Once they received their monthly box, customers had a five day period where they could try on the clothes. They'd keep the items they wanted and return the ones they didn't using the included return box.

But as Frank And Oak started to better understand its customers through the technology it used to offer personalized service, the brand's strategy began to branch out.

In 2013, Frank And Oak opened its first permanent retail location. Just two years later, it would have six stores across Canada. And in 2016, following thousands of requests from customers, the brand added womenswear to its apparel line.

A 2015 BetaKit article quoted co-founder Ethan Song describing Frank And Oak as "a tech-first company" where "the experience is the product," highlighting "community, personalization and integration" as the most important building blocks for a brand.

Its omnichannel strategy sought to make shopping for clothes less transaction-focused and more experiential, with its flagship retail location integrating a café and a barber shop and its website featuring a chatbot and team of stylists ready to help customers by making personalized recommendations.

And while the overall experience is still at the forefront for Frank And Oak, the company redefined its mission in 2017 when it pledged to focus on sustainability, starting with more sustainable apparel – a counterpoint to the popularity of fast fashion throughout the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s, informed by a growing number of consumers looking to make more environmentally-conscious buying decisions.

Nadia explained how sustainability is at the heart of Frank And Oak today.

Nadia Famularo: A lot of our products are responsibly produced using more sustainable fabrics, recycled polyester rather than virgin polyester, et cetera. And we try to bring the sustainability mindset to not just the clothing that's produced, but the way we operate as a business as well. And so we're present online, and also we have over a dozen stores across Canada where we do business.

We've had a chance to really become a leader, especially in the Canadian fashion space. We became B Corp certified several years ago.

Robert Zirk: According to B Lab, the non-profit network governing the certification, B Corps are companies that have been assessed as meeting high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability to all stakeholders – not only its shareholders – and transparency in their operations.

Nadia Famularo: We have partnerships with organizations like Earth Day Canada. And with that, I think, as we've seen across industries, there's been more of a call to action, but also just more of a desire to see sustainability in everything that we do.

Robert Zirk: And that coincides with a generational shift toward personal, social and environmental values, like sustainability, as an increasingly important purchasing factor for customers. A McKinsey survey of US-based customers showed that 75% of millennials consider sustainability in their buying decisions, compared to 66% of all respondents. And according to a First Insight survey, 62% of Gen Z consumers prefer to buy from sustainable brands. Brands can't afford to treat sustainability like a trend that goes in and out of style. Sustainability is what a growing number of customers expect.

Today, Frank And Oak's website describes its purpose as to "inspire a better way of living by creating conscious products that last through time." That includes designing its clothing with eco-friendly materials and sustainable processes, reducing the amount of packaging it uses in shipping while also using recyclable or compostable options and even making use of locally-sourced or upcycled furniture in its retail stores. Beyond manufacturing a more sustainable product, Nadia highlighted how Frank And Oak's commitment to sustainability plays a leading role in the decisions it makes as a brand and as a business.

Nadia Famularo: We're just continuously trying to find ways to add more sustainability and more eco-conscious ways of doing things across our business. We have some partnerships in our fulfillment and last mile part of the business. For example, we partner with GoBolt, which is a Canadian-based company as well, to provide electric vehicle delivery to a lot of our key markets. And so with that, a lot of our deliveries across Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver – the biggest cities in Canada, but also naturally where our biggest customer bases are – can benefit from that sustainable experience.

Robert Zirk: According to a Statista survey, nearly eight out of 10 shoppers worldwide would consider a more sustainable delivery option when they order online. And a survey from Stuart, a last mile delivery platform based in Europe, found that 27 percent of consumers in the UK would be willing to pay more for a delivery that's eco-friendly.

I asked Nadia what specifically prompted Frank And Oak's pivot to a focus on sustainability.

Nadia Famularo: Customers have just been getting smarter about what they buy, the intent with which they buy: do they want something that they're going to wear once? Is it something that they're going to want to buy and then wear over time? And so that's also part of, beyond the sustainable production of our clothing, is the quality and the longevity and the adaptability of our clothing to the everyday lifestyle of the Frank And Oak consumer. And so that also is just naturally where our customers are evolving to as well. And buying for quality rather than quantity, for example.

Robert Zirk: Although the global subscription box market continues to grow, with an imarc report estimating a 14% annual growth rate and $105 billion market value by 2032, the continued drive for sustainability led to the discontinuation of Frank And Oak's Style Plan subscription service in 2021, which had been launched three years earlier as an adaptation of previous membership programs.

Nadia noted that while the COVID-19 pandemic and a decrease in discretionary spending among consumers accelerated that particular change, sustainability and the customer experience remain the deciding factors for how Frank And Oak moves forward to meet customer expectations.

Nadia Famularo: Ultimately, the subscription was not sustainable on many fronts including the high return rate that comes with a model like that. And so, adding shipments to and from customers constantly on a monthly or bimonthly basis, when you go behind the curtain a bit, it increases our carbon emissions. It increases the shipping. Instead, we've shifted away from that, really focused on driving more meaningful customer experience online and in stores more regularly.

And our store associates are also really versed in our products, can make suggestions, but it's also a great customer feedback point for us, too. We can understand more conversationally rather than just checking off a box on a form, like, what was wrong with the product? Why are they returning it? And then be able to make really personalized recommendations on how to adjust further and then also share that feedback through our internal feedback loops as well.

Robert Zirk: Technology has played an important role in shaping how Frank And Oak continues to strive for a more sustainable customer experience. A recent change is the introduction of omnichannel fulfillment, where inventory could potentially be shipped from a nearby store location rather than the warehouse.

Nadia Famularo: It's more strategically thinking about where inventory is positioned so that if you're ordering in Vancouver...

Robert Zirk: ...on Canada's west coast...

Nadia Famularo: ...and our store in Vancouver has all the items you're ordering, rather than having that order shipped from somewhere in Ontario...

Robert Zirk: ...which is about 2,100 miles or 3,400 kilometers east...

Nadia Famularo: ...we can ship it from there. So it's a shorter distance traveled, whether it's electric vehicle and already carbon neutral, or just offset - regardless, the emissions of shipping that order will be lesser. It's a faster delivery time for the customer overall, a more cost effective one also.

The technology to be able to roll that out required a lot of investment and integration in our tech stack. So it involves introducing a new OMS or order management system that can help route our orders more intelligently to the right location.

There's a logic there as well, in terms of order orchestration, that's very driven by tech and automations to match up where the customer's ordering from, which store location has the full order for the customer if you're ordering multiple items. Does the store have all of the items? Does it have three out of four? So three will ship from there to benefit from that closer distance, that better kind of inventory positioning and have another one come through as well.

Obviously we try as much as possible to ship an order in one package, right? And then it's the fine line of when you think of sustainability, how many packages are we willing to split up that order into to get the customer all the items they want, or on the other side, from a business perspective, do we not share that that inventory can be sold to a customer depending on if it's available only in a store versus our warehouse, for example?

Robert Zirk: Automations and data insights also help in terms of inventory planning, allocating types of apparel based on regional climates and customer profiles. And on the ecommerce side, customer data is also leveraged with AI to create personalized recommendations.

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