As CX specialists, we are obsessed with metrics that help businesses optimize the experience they provide to customers. KPIs like C-SAT, NPS, and CES track and measure vital aspects of CX. But that’s not what I talk about here. 

Recently, we formulated the Emotional Value Index (EVI), a metric capable of capturing a holistic, more accurate, and reliable picture of your CX strategy. It supersedes other metrics by overcoming the areas they fall short when assessing CX. It’s simply revolutionizing the CX arena.

Here’s why I think EVI® is perhaps the only metric you need to look right through your customers!  

Emotions drive our purchasing behavior and decisions. They can even hamper rationale and persuade us to make impulsive purchases. By evoking the right emotions, businesses can improve CX and attract customers. For this, you have to understand how customers are feeling when engaging with your brand at present. Only then it is possible to make relevant improvements and keep customers delighted from beginning to end. EVI is the superstar that makes it possible! It is a metric designed to measure the emotional experience of customers. 

Emotional Experience (EE) is a concept that looks at the overall emotional perception a customer has towards the brand. Simply put, how do they feel about your brand? EE plays a powerful role in customer retention rate, loyalty and advocacy, and brand equity. Positive EE nurtures a brand with a strong and supportive customer base. 

EVI® aims to track, measure, and analyze emotions that dominate the customer journey, and project the kind of emotional experience delivered by your brand. EVI® can be used at both micro and macro levels of CX. You can apply it for any touchpoint, buyer journey stage, or channel. You can measure one aspect of CX or the overall experience using EVI®. It’s this versatility of EVI® that makes it the perfect CX metric that any business can benefit from. 

By tapping into customer emotions, EVI gives you a better understanding of your customers. As I emphasize to my clients, data tells you a lot about your customers’ preferences, requirements, and expectations. EVI gathers data related to customer emotions.

The EVI survey contains the simple request of,

Please select the emotion that best describes your emotional state regarding….”

For choice, the most common emotions associated with a customer’s buying journey are selected. They are usually enthusiasm, joy, trust, surprise, disappointment, sadness, irritation, and frustration. These are represented in a circle because emotions are non-linear in nature. In the middle of the circle, there is “indifference” that customers can choose if they don’t feel anything towards the business. 

The above emotions are categorized into clusters based on their impact and amplitude. It makes measuring them easier. These clusters are then assigned values ranging from -1 to +1 as shown in the diagram below

Once you have gathered the survey results, you have to segment the answers by putting them in the relevant cluster. You then take the weighted average of each cluster based on the times an emotion appears in the responses. It will provide a value between -1 to +1, which can then be converted to a value between -100 to +100. At Feedbackly, we have automated this process for you! 

By analyzing EVI survey results, businesses can identify where customers experience pain points and rectify them. You can also correlate them with sales data to determine the emotions that generate the highest sales and implement strategies to evoke them. Overall, businesses should strive to provide a streamlined and consistent experience where customers feel happy and comfortable engaging with the business. It can lead to a higher EVI® score, thereby impacting revenue, growth, brand recognition, and competitiveness.

Interested in learning more? Check more on the EVI website at emotionalvalueindex.com or read more from Feedbackly website’s blog!

Published 2.2.2017

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