Business guru Peter Drucker famously said, “The purpose of a 1 business is to create a customer.” Six decades after he penned that sentence, a number of enormously successful CEOs have taken Drucker’s credo to the max, among them Jeff Bezos of Amazon (who has driven his firm to focus on “customer obsession” vs. 2 “competitor obsession” ) and Richard Branson (whose many Virgin 3 companies have ascended in industries known for poor service ). Those and other CEOs believe that creating customers and keeping them happy is at the center of their success. Unfortunately, digital transformation efforts and recurring revenue. They have found at companies across the globe often aren’t that superlative, consistent, and authentic putting customers at the center of their experiences have better ROI than advertising. endeavors. Instead, new technologies are being used to create operational efficiencies Enterprises across the globe are making to reduce costs. While that’s important, too significant investments in digital often the price companies pay for this narrow transformation efforts. Technology researcher focus is exasperated customers struggling with International Data Corp. forecasts that these poorly designed experiences and inconsistent expenditures will climb by 16.8% in 2018 to and inauthentic touch points with the brand. nearly $1.3 trillion. By 2021, they will have 4 jumped to more than $2.1 trillion. This rapid Yet a number of other businesses, both B2B proliferation of smart technologies, combined and B2C, are starting to realize that digital with the declining cost of computing and transformation strategies must begin with the storage power, has put most technologies, customer experience (CX). They understand especially analytics and advanced machine that creating a differentiated and competitive learning, in the hands of practically every experience attracts new customers and keeps business, no matter its size. Thus, just having them coming back—a major driver of profit the latest technology won’t provide a competitive advantage. 1 HarperBusiness Reissue, The Practice of Management, by Peter Drucker, 2006. Accessed May 23, 2018, https://www.harpercollins. com/9780060878979/the-practice-of-management/ 2 Business Insider, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Explains His Famous One-character Emails, Known to Strike Fear in Manager’s Hearts, April 22, 2018, accessed May 23, 2018, http://www.businessinsider.com/bezos-explains-his-dreaded-one-character-emails-2018-4 3 Inc., Richard Branson: Why Customers Come Second at Virgin, accessed May 22, 2018, https://www.inc.com/eric-schurenberg/sir-richard-branson- put-your-staff-first-customers-second-and-shareholders-third.html 4 IDC, IDC Forecasts Worldwide Spending on Digital Transformation Technologies to Reach $1.3 Trillion in 2018, December 15, 2017, accessed May 23, 2018, https://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS43381817 1