Today’s episode of the Punk CX podcast is with Greg Kihlström from The Agile Brand. Greg is a best-selling author, speaker, and entrepreneur, and serves as an advisor and consultant to top companies on marketing technology, marketing operations, and digital transformation initiatives. A couple of months ago, Greg invited me to be a guest on his show, and we took the opportunity to meet up and record the episode while he was in Scotland recently on vacation. We covered a lot of ground, including the state of customer experience, what brands get right and what they don’t and hyper-personalisation. It went so well I thought I’d release it as an episode on the Punk CX podcast too.

This interview follows on from my recent interview – Envisioning a personal AI agent for every customer – Interview with Malte Kosub of Parloa – and is number 552 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Here are the highlights of my chat with Greg:

• Despite an increased focus on CX, we are still seeing a decline in CX (Customer Experience) indices.
• A key reason for this is the widening gap between accelerating customer expectations and brands’ ability to keep up.
• During the pandemic, there was more “forgiveness” from customers regarding service, but expectations have since returned to pre-pandemic levels.
• The phrase “the future of customer experience is always built in the present” highlights the importance of addressing current customer problems rather than solely focusing on future technology like AI.
• Successful leaders in CX balance planning for the future with fixing present-day issues.
• Forrester recently announced “TX” (Total Experience), which combines brand experience and customer experience, though there is skepticism about its novelty and effectiveness.
• There’s a concern that the CX industry itself has become siloed and too self-interested, rather than focusing on the holistic customer experience.
• Adrian challenges the notion that someone can be an “expert in customer experience,” arguing that one cannot be an expert in someone else’s experience; rather, expertise lies in gathering and acting on customer perspectives.
• Many organizations lack a clear vision and strategy for customer experience, leading to initiatives that aren’t tied to business relevance or ROI.
• Leaders should aim to create “organizational social capital” by making others’ jobs easier and proving the commercial relevance of CX initiatives.
• The conversation emphasizes that while data informs, stories move us, and experiences compel us, advocating for leaders to engage directly with frontline operations and customers.
• The “personalization dip” is discussed, noting that while personalization can be effective, hyper-personalization can be off-putting and not always economically worthwhile, especially if basic customer needs aren’t met first.
• Greg’s best advice: Just because you can doesn’t mean you should are words to live by. I think it really is about asking those tough questions about what do you really want to be to your customers.
• Greg’s Punk CX brand: Stitch Fix and Ministry of Supply.

About Greg

Greg Kihlström is a best-selling author, speaker, and entrepreneur, and serves as an advisor and consultant to top companies on marketing technology, marketing operations, and digital transformation initiatives. He has worked with some of the world’s top brands, including Adidas, Coca-Cola, FedEx, HP, Marriott, Nationwide Insurance, Victoria’s Secret, and Toyota.

He hosts the award-winning The Agile Brand with Greg Kihlström, now top 10 on Apple’s U.S. marketing charts and in its 7th year with over 700 episodes and millions of downloads, which discusses marketing technology and its role in the customer experience with some of the world’s leading experts and leaders.

Find out more about Greg at his website, check out The Agile Brand shows, say Hi to him on X (Twitter) and Instagram @gregkihlstrom and @theagilebrand respectively, and feel free to connect with him on LinkedIn here.

Credit: Photo by Eugene Chystiakov on Unsplash