10 Actionable Insights from CX Circle: The DX Gala Sydney

We’re still buzzing from October’s  CX Circle: The DX Gala, an inspiring gathering of senior leaders for a day of networking, insightful sessions and of course, espresso martinis.

We had speakers from renowned Australian brands like R.M.Williams, Suncorp, Foxtel, and ABC (to name a few) in the spotlight, sharing their insights on what it takes to create Oscar-worthy digital experiences for your customers.

Want to relive the evening or looking for practical tips to deliver an award-winning digital experience? Here are 10 key actionable insights you can take back to your brand.

Adapt your working style to better support your team

Multiple slides, charts, and spreadsheets can be intimidating if you’re unfamiliar with data. 

So R.M.William’s Quaetapo brought the data to the design team with Figma, an interface design tool. He explained designers aren’t always able to digest data the way an analyst would, so the team decided to work on a platform that their design team was already familiar with.

Working in Figma, the digital team can track past designs and the performance history of each page element in one place, making it easier to identify opportunities to improve the digital experience.

Never stop analyzing with a continuous feedback process

The team collects enough data through Google Analytics, Contentsquare, and Salesforce to analyze the performance of the latest design iterations. They then include learnings into the next iteration, using the collected data to continuously improve their designs and create a better digital experience.

Price-sensitive shoppers will buy earlier to avoid price hikes

As living costs rise, 34% of Australians plan to shop earlier this holiday season.

Salesforce’s Marcella Larsen predicts online stores will drive early buying, but customers will still flock to physical stores for last-minute deals. Expect heavier discounts this holiday too, with average discount rates increasing to 20% from 17% in 2021. 

Before the holiday season, ensure you’ve optimized your website for heavy traffic across mobile and desktop devices. Test your digital journeys and fix any problems early to drive sales during this critical period.

It’s the value-driven customer’s time to shine.

During COVID, customers prioritized convenience and safety.

Now they seek retailers who can provide the best value and shopping experience. 

Providing customers with a blended physical and digital experience has become even more critical now, with customers researching in-store, then purchasing online, or vice versa. Work with your in-store team to create a stellar omnichannel experience. 

Create digital versions of humans’ best traits. 

Through everyday interactions, we can learn a lot about human traits we can bring to digital platforms. This enables your brand to show trust, empathy and encourages conversation to develop a deeper and more meaningful relationship with you.

Here’s how financial services and insurance provider Suncorp shows trust, empathy and encourages conversation in their digital experiences. 

Trust: Removing customer ratings from their web pages decreased quote start rates by 2.3%, showing displaying social proof helped build trust with web visitors and nudged people to reach out for an insurance quote.  

Empathy: On sales experiences targeted at older adults, Suncorp changed the default page zoom to 150% to make text easier to read and‌ clickable elements easier to access for senior citizens. These little touches showed empathy for their target audience and increased sales by 12.9%.

Conversation: The traditional insurance quote form is overwhelming to fill up, featuring multiple pages with 7-8 questions per page. Suncorp re-wrote the form more conversationally and displayed one question at a time to make the entire experience easier to navigate and fill up, improving closed sales by 20-25%. 

The metrics speak for themselves – customers love digital experiences that feel human. 

Quick tests and big projects go hand in hand 

The Suncorp team groups digital optimization efforts into two work streams: smaller, always-on tweaks and long-term projects 

Smaller tests, like removing ratings, could be done in minutes, and they’d provide valuable insight into what customers want. Suncorp invests in bigger projects, too, like using AI to mimic body language in the sales process.

Enabling two work streams allows the team to be more agile and solve problems more efficiently while ensuring they’re constantly innovating. 

Make ideation a team effort

For two hours a week, Foxtel got product, tech, and UX teams to come up with personalization ideas.

This led to: 

• More ownership and accountability for participating teams 
• Tripled output with less time spent
• Analytics isn’t a bottleneck anymore

Takeaway? Doing ideation together sure beats having one analytics specialist going at it alone.

Empower digital teams with self-service options 

For successful team ideation, you’ve got to have self-sustaining processes and materials anyone can use, such as:

• Manuals and glossaries to train everyone involved.
• Self-service dashboard templates in Contentsquare and your data analytics tool
• A regular review process to review submitted ideas 

Designing for accessibility = (a lot) more people served 

26,000 people in the US have permanently lost one arm. 

But 13 million people in the US lose the use of one arm temporarily, either through injury or illness, while 8 million people need hands-free solutions (think of nursing and cleaning at the same time, for example.)

Designing for digital accessibility allows your product and brand to reach a larger group than you might think. Deliver a stellar experience for the 26,000 and 21 million people benefit. (that’s 81 times more people served!) 

Don’t try to be everything to everyone 

Grounding advice from Dr. Manisha Amin from the Centre for Inclusive Design, there’s no perfect website for accessibility.

Instead, keep your goals smaller. Focus on nudging the system by 5% rather than trying to change the world. 

Instead, know who you’re designing for, and focus on meeting their functional needs. If someone couldn’t see, touch, smell, or hear, what would make this digital experience work for them?

Missed it? Don’t sweat it. 

If you weren’t able to attend CX Circle Sydney, don’t worry because we’ve got you covered.