Customer experience (CX) is defined as “the customer’s perceptions and related feelings caused by the one-off and cumulative effect of interactions with a supplier’s employees, systems, channels, or products” (Gartner).
Essentially, customer experience is the culmination of everything people think and feel about your brand. Since CX is this all-encompassing, transformative aspect of a brand, it’s no surprise there’s an abundance of amazing quotes from thought leaders about this topic. Here are some of our favorites.
“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.” – Warren Buffett
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou
“Loyal customers, they don’t just come back, they don’t simply recommend you, they insist that their friends do business with you.” – Chip Bell
“Just having satisfied customers isn’t good enough anymore. If you really want a booming business, you have to create raving fans.” ― Ken Blanchard
“Think of your WORST customer on his or her WORST day…This is when you’ll really discover how to be ready for the hiccups that are bound to happen, even with your best customer.” — Jeannie Walters
“A customer is the most important visitor on our premises, he is not dependent on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it. He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us an opportunity to do so.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“CXM = The art and science of coaxing lifetime loyalty from daily transactions.” – Steve Curtin
“If you don’t care, your customer never will.” – Marlene Blaszczyk
“Exceptional customer experiences are the only sustainable platform for competitive differentiation.” — Kerry Bodine
“Don’t try to tell the customer what he wants. If you want to be smart, be smart in the shower. Then get out, go to work, and serve the customer!” ― Gene Buckley
“Customer experience isn’t an expense. Managing customer experience bolsters your brand.” – Stan Phelps
“No matter how beautiful the visual design is, if it fails to help our users achieve their goals, it’s bad design. ” — Crystal C. Yan
“The customer’s perception is your reality.” – Kate Zabriskie
“There is only one boss. The customer―and he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.” ― Sam Walton
“A good design shows respect for your customer and you’re either respectful of their time or respectful of what it is that they desire, and so it makes it a very fundamental element to everything that you do.” – Penny Wilson
“If we consistently exceed the expectations of employees, they will consistently exceed the expectations of our customers.” – Shep Hyken
“Make the customer the hero of your story.” – Ann Handley
“Always remember that everyone with whom you have a relationship has an invisible sign on their forehead that says, ‘Make me feel important.’ Treat them accordingly.” – Eric Philip Cowell
“If you are not taking care of your customers, your competitor will.” – Bob Hooey
“If you make customers unhappy in the physical world, they might each tell 6 friends. If you make customers unhappy on the Internet, they can each tell 6,000 friends.” – Jeff Bezos
“Customer experience better be at the top of your list when it comes to priorities in your organization. Customer experience is the new marketing.” – Steve Cannon
“Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it. It is what the customer gets out of it.” – Peter Drucker
“Building a good customer experience does not happen by accident. It happens by design.” – Clare Muscutt
“It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the customer who pays the wages.” – Henry Ford
“Don’t reinvent the wheel. Focus on winning one customer at a time. Be honest and sincere. Do what’s right. There’s nothing magical about this. That’s been my guiding principle. To make it work, you have to live it every day. Make it your mindset.” — Robert Spector
“Customer experience is one of the two core pillars of customer retention; the thing is, you can’t grow if your customers don’t stick around.” – Jes Kirkwood
“Get to know your customers. Humanize them. Humanize yourself. It’s worth it.” – Kristin Smaby
“When the customer comes first, the customer will last.” – Robert Half
“If you don’t appreciate your customers, someone else will.” – Jason Langella
“The most valuable resource you can give customers is your time. Listen to them to uncover their real needs. Only then can you find a way to solve their problems or meet their expectations. Treat the cause, not just the symptoms.” – Ginger Conlon
“The key is to set realistic customer expectations, and then not to just meet them, but to exceed them—preferably in unexpected and helpful ways.” – Richard Branson
“Revolve your world around the customer and more customers will revolve around you.” – Heather Williams
“You’re serving a customer, not a life sentence. Learn how to enjoy your work.” – Laurie McIntosh
“To earn the respect (and eventually love) of your customers, you first have to respect those customers. That is why Golden Rule behavior is embraced by most of the winning companies.” – Colleen Barrett
“How you think about your customer influences how you respond to them.” – Marilyn Suttle
“Customers will never love a company until the employees love it first.” – Simon Sinek
“Everyone from the CEO down to the contact center agent should know what it feels like to be a customer.” – Blake Morgan
“You will get all you want in life, if you help enough other people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar
“Ease your customers’ pain.” – Hazel Edwards
“When you serve the customer better, they always return on your investment.” – Kara Parlin
“The customer is why we are here. If we take good care of them, they’ll give us good reason to come back.” – Jenny McKenzie
“Worry about being better; bigger will take care of itself. Think one customer at a time and take care of each one the best way you can.” –Gary Comer
“The Customer: Someone that indirectly pays for your food, clothes, and vacations. Be nice to them.” — Gene Caballero
“Being in a curiosity mindset means being fascinated by your customers and their reactions.” – Jake Knapp
“The purpose of a business is to create a customer who creates customers.” – Shiv Singh
“It is so much easier to be nice, to be respectful, to put yourself in your customer’s’ shoes and try to understand how you might help them before they ask for help, than it is to try to mend a broken customer relationship.” – Mark Cuban
“Always keep in mind the old retail adage: Customers remember the service a lot longer than they remember the price.” – Lauren Freedman
“Here is a powerful yet simple rule. Always give people more than they expect to get.” – Nelson Boswell
“Every contact we have with a customer influences whether or not they’ll come back. We have to be great every time or we’ll lose them.” –Kevin Stirtz
“Instead of focusing on the competition, focus on the customer.” – Scott Cook
“The first step in exceeding your customer’s expectations is to know those expectations.” – Roy H. Williams
“Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves.” – Steve Jobs
“Make a customer, not a sale.” – Katherine Barchetti
“Satisfied customer is the best source of advertisement” – G.S. Alag
“The way to a customer’s heart is much more than a loyalty program. Making customer evangelists is about creating experiences worth talking about.” – Valeria Maltoni
“No amount of advertising can repair the damage done by failing to properly address a customer’s concern.” – Albert Schindler
“If you make a sale, you make a living. If you make an investment of time and good service in a customer, you can make a fortune.” – John Rohn
“Customers who love you will market for you more powerfully than you can possibly market yourself.” – Jeanne Bliss
“It is not your customer’s job to remember you, it is your obligation and responsibility to make sure they don’t have the chance to forget you.” – Patricia Fripp
Did we miss any? What are your favorite customer experience quotes?
