2017: Year of the connected customer

By Brian Donn, 
We are now squarely in the age of the customer. Customers are more empowered and choose how and where they want to engage the brands they buy products or services from. 
As we move into 2017, now more than ever, customers are clearly in charge and, as a result, businesses that understand what their customers need and want are winning.
Let’s check out three critical elements that will feature in your data-driven journey into 2017.
1.Making the move from personalisation to individualisation
“Individualization is achieved when customer intention is anticipated, understood, and actioned in the moment,” says Krisi Mansfield, CX Strategy & Transformation Director, Oracle APAC in this short clip. This means giving the customer the experience they want and desire to a segment of one. This has been talked about for some time, but true individualization occurs at a level of (customer experience) CX maturity that very few organizations have been able to achieve.
To create individualized experiences, CX leaders must:
Structure experiences around customer journeys: To do this, CX Leaders need to identify the journeys their customers take, the data that indicates a customer is on a given journey, and the content and functionality they need to move closer to their goal. 
Ask how customer data can inform each interaction: Don’t start individualization efforts by trying to come up with uses for available customer data. CX leaders should start by asking how a specific interaction can be individualized for the customer. After articulating how the interaction can be improved, ask what customer data is required to make it happen. 
Get agile: Individualized experiences are an emerging category of experiences. As a result, best practices and design patterns are still being defined. This means that CX Leaders interested in creating individualized experiences need to take an agile approach that focuses on rapid prototyping, failing fast, and quick release cycles rather than strung-out processes. 
2.Unlocking the value of Internet of Things
With every human expected to own some 20 or more connected devices by the year 2020, the Internet of Things (IoT) is one phenomenon brands can’t afford to ignore! 
Forrester outlines, while everyone knows that great customer experiences lie at the heart of digital business, what’s less understood is the connection between great customer experiences and operational excellence. Simply put, IoT brings speed to operations and processes that, ultimately, lead to a better customer experience.
On the flip side of the same coin, where we will soon have trillions of connected devices, we should also explore how the information from these IoTdevices will allow CX pros to better understand how customers interact with different platforms and channels by directly tapping into data from the devices they are interacting with. These insights are reframing the way we do business, from re-active to pro-active and predictive, and are increasingly changing how consumers behave and what they expect. 
3.Chatbots to become major part of CX by 2020
Okay, so now we leap from2017 to 2020 with this prediction.
A recent Oracle report found that Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR) are set to reshape customer experiences by 2020. More than three quarters (78 percent) of brands say they have already implemented, or are planning to implement AI and VR by 2020 to better serve customers.
When it comes to chatbots – one of the most recognisable forms of AI – 80 percent of sales and marketing leaders say they already use these in their CX technologies or plan to do so by 2020.
Consumers and B2B decision-makers want relevant content at the right time – that is the promise of AI, which in turn, is powered by data. 
Whether it’s an AI chatbot or a social community manager acting on behalf of the brand, the customer data profile that is being drawn on to inform customer interactions must be complete and accurate. With information on a customer’s previous purchases, recent service issues, social media interactions, and preferred channels for interaction, a brand is better prepared to serve them.
2017 is going to be an exciting, change-filled year. To succeed in this CX-obsessed world, companies must get closer to their customers and put in place the right processes to empower data and analytic driven decisions. In the end, the companies that show a deep understanding of their customers will be set to win the CX race.
(The writer is Asia Pacific Vice President of CX for Oracle)