Joe Ruiz

About Joe Ruiz

Joseph Ruiz is an expert in Customer Experience Marketing. Joseph is President of Strategic Marketing Solutions, a full-service marketing and consulting firm specializing in web-based integrated Relationship Marketing. Joseph thrives on the ever-changing nature of marketing in the digital age, embracing interactive opportunities, while applying three decades of hands-on expertise in online and traditional marketing. When he’s not helping business-makers navigate through complex marketing challenges, Joseph enjoys reading, working out and traveling just about anywhere…anywhere you can get a digital signal, that is.

The Secret Sauce to Unlocking the Customer Experience

The business landscape is continuing to evolve at an increasingly rapid pace, creating new challenges that are way beyond the traditional competitive pressures of product and service innovation. In the current environment, entire business models are emerging and morphing in an attempt to provide personal and relevant customer experiences. Companies like Google and Tesla routinely…

Five Ways to Embrace the Customer Experience Disruption

Many current business models are being disrupted. Retail is exhibit A. Retailers that are just providing shelf space will soon be out of business. Amazon is continually disrupting existing business models by combining a customer experience based on utility, with convenience at the center of their strategy. The multi-channel buying habits of consumers demanding a…

5 Ways Panera Bread Creates an Engaging Customer Experience – A Case Study

Panera Bread wants to be a comfortable place for their customers to gather. Their stores have been designed to invite and welcome customers to enjoy relaxing, conversation, reading; all in a casual atmosphere. Panera has built a successful business based on providing an experience that was aligned with their mission; until it wasn’t. The brand…

The 3 Essential Practices for Sustained Positive Customer Experiences

Even though we are just beginning the second quarter of 2017, there have already been some awful customer experience meltdowns. Most of you have probably already seen them, and some are quite disturbing. One could speculate on the contributing factors to these meltdowns because they are easy targets. Regardless of how you feel about the…

6 Internal Gaps that Disrupt the Customer Experience

Gaps contribute to poor customer experiences. I have written about these in the past. I have also written about customer experience tools that can help brands close or eliminate these gaps. The stakes are high! A customer is 4 times more likely to buy from a competitor if the problem is service related vs. price or product…

Do You know Your Customer’s Expectations? – 25 Important Stats to Consider

Customer expectations are high, and growing! To provide a differentiating customer experience, you must exceed, or at least meet expectations. Survey data indicates many brands are now focusing on the customer experience. Reaching mobile consumers requires a whole new mindset; brands are increasingly relying on customer-centric strategies and tactics. They are creating personas and journey maps to…

How to Create a Differentiating Customer Experience Using the 4 P’s of Creativity

It may be a challenge to read about 4 P’s of anything related to business and not think of marketing. James Rhodes was a scientist and researcher who conducted a great deal of research on creativity. He is the architect of the framework for the 4 P’s of creativity. The four P’s are: People Process…

5 Amazingly Simple Customer Experience Dashboard Hacks

You don’t have to look too far to find customer relationship management software systems; most are designed to track customer purchase behaviors. Some of the more sophisticated products are capable of tracking pre and post-purchase behaviors. It’s no secret that the customer experience is key to attracting and retaining customers. Consumers are quick to share…

5 Ways to Harness Insight and Creativity to Deliver Better Customer Experiences

In addition to my marketing business, I teach creativity and innovation at a nearby university. This new curriculum is a response to feedback from business leaders expressing a concern that graduates are not prepared to respond to the creative challenges of the constantly changing business landscape. According to a Boston Consulting Group survey, 79% of…

5 Essential Steps to a Differentiating Customer Experience

Increasingly businesses are realizing the connection between a differentiating customer experience and profitability. It’s no secret that the pace of change and innovation is continuing to accelerate, creating a dynamic landscape that is forcing companies to find ways to foster and sustain creativity and innovation. Even if you are maintaining, in all likelihood you are…

3 Critical Characteristics of Values-Based Marketing

Values-based leadership is an effective model for creating a climate where individual and corporate values are aligned. The single greatest predictor of relational longevity is aligned values. It’s true in marriage and it’s true in business. I believe values-based marketing can be equally important. I define the concept here. In this post, I am not…

10 Ways to Creatively Improve Customer Experience

A Gartner survey predicted by this year (2016) 89% of companies expect to compete mostly on the basis of customer experience. Four years ago this number was 36%. For as long as I can remember businesses have focused on creating efficiencies as a way to improve profitability. Connected consumers are putting increasing pressure on brands…

10 Key Customer Experience Design Factors to Consider

We live in a world where change is the new normal. Just about anyone in business these days has to be able to deal with change on an increasingly frequent basis. Customers now have a growing number of options, from new start-ups to consumer packaged goods giants; everyone is recognizing the value of focusing on…

3 Dimensions that Drive a Differentiating Customer Experience

We like to do business with people we _______. When I ask this as a question the answer is almost always a single word – trust. Edelman has created a Trust Barometer. It’s an annual study to examine the impact of trust on businesses. The most recent survey indicates that trust is down in many…

Closing the Customer Experience Gap: 10 Questions to Ask

I probably don’t have to spend much time trying to convince people that there is a gap between the experience customers expect and the one they actually receive. Before I just gloss over the evidence, let’s just say that there is a significant population of marketing executives who believe they are providing a great customer…

7 Questions to Help Create Healthy Employee Engagement

In a recent post, I wrote about employee engagement and offered five ways to engage employees. Apparently I am not the only one thinking about this based on the shares the post enjoyed. There are any number of stats that reveal anemic levels of employee engagement, even among managers. I decided to pursue the topic…

5 Ways to Engage Employees To Build A Better Customer Experience

People say they will pay more for a better customer experience. More importantly, they will leave to go to a competitor after a bad experience. 86% of people will pay more for a better customer experience, and 89% will go to a competitor after a bad one. Source State of Marketing Report 2015 In that…

Customer Centricity Slogan or Experience?

When CMO’s were surveyed, 73% said that customer centricity was critical to their business strategy. Of this group only 14% indicated that customer centricity was a hallmark of their brand. Most telling, only 11% believe their customers would agree that their brand is customer centric. Being customer centric feels like a no-brainer goal. Who wouldn’t…

6 Essential Customer Experience Questions You Must Answer

Think about a recent mediocre customer experience, if you are struggling with this, think about a bad one. What made it less than ideal? Now think about a product or service you love, love enough to recommend. Why do you love it? Most people are to able come up with at least one brand in…

4 Keys to Creating a Differentiating Customer Experience

Recently I wrote about five ways to create an engaging customer experience. Based on post blog activity, there seems to be some interest in the topic. In this previous post I identified five ways of creating an engaging customer experience as: Providing Utility Nurturing Community Creating Connection Offering Choices Delivering Convenience Customer experience is becoming…

5 Design Principles That Drive Social Customer Experience Marketing

Traditional marketing used to be known for its inside out approach. The idea was to create a cumulative series of messages known as brand impressions. Marketers bought media and launched campaign after campaign designed to generate sufficient awareness so the consumer would respond to these messages at the point of purchase and buy the product….