Now Brands Talk · 2022-11-09 · 9 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
30 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
After a year of interviewing leaders at brands like Square, Carta, Assembled, and Salesforce, the Now Brands Talk hosts synthesize the dominant lessons from their first season. The episode distills three interconnected themes that emerged repeatedly across conversations. Empathy - understanding customer emotions and needs at every touchpoint - proved to be the most critical foundation, exemplified by Brian Solis's work at Salesforce on perspective-taking. The second theme centers on empowerment: as automation handles routine inquiries, human agents become more valuable, making their professional development and quality of life essential investments. Anna Skidmore's dual focus on employee and customer experience at BFA exemplifies this shift. The third theme is systemic: customer experience is not a support function but an organizational imperative spanning sales, marketing, product, and brand strategy. Colin Chow's work at 21st Century Brand illustrates how brand strategy itself becomes the tool for aligning teams and tearing down silos. The episode is valuable for B2B leaders seeking to understand how technology, people, and organizational alignment work together to drive customer loyalty and lifetime value.
Empathy means understanding what customers want to do, how they feel, and what emotion you want them to experience, then designing interactions that address all three - for example, using proactive conversational AI to reduce decision fatigue when customers are overwhelmed by options.
Automation should handle low-value repetitive questions (like password resets) so human agents are freed up for high-impact conversations that drive loyalty and revenue, requiring parallel investment in agent development and experience quality.
Every customer interaction across sales, marketing, product, and support contributes to one unified experience, and customers don't care which team owns them at any moment - only that interactions help them get jobs done, making cross-functional alignment and brand strategy critical.
The episode emphasizes that CX leaders must adopt a dual focus on both customer and employee experience, recognizing that empowered, supported agents become drivers of business impact rather than cost centers.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
The episode recycles three well-known CX principles (empathy, empowerment, holistic experience) with minimal novel insight. The hiking pants example and chatbot discussion are generic illustrations of standard best practices rather than surprising or non-obvious claims. Most CX operators would already be familiar with these framings.
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. And when we're talking about customer experience, there's really nothing more important than understanding how your customers are feeling and what they want or need at any given moment.
When your human team no longer has to answer those low value repetitive questions like how to reset a password, they're suddenly available to have more and more valuable interactions with your customers.
The three themes are broadly established orthodoxy in CX discourse - empathy, agent empowerment, and cross-functional alignment are standard talking points in the field. The episode does not challenge or reframe these ideas; it simply summarizes them as season conclusions without counterintuitive angles or first-principles thinking.
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. And when we're talking about customer experience, there's really nothing more important than understanding how your customers are feeling
Brands that can improve the quality of an interaction for both the customer and the human agent on the other side of the chat are going to reap the benefits of happier customers and more impactful employees.
The episode name-drops credible guests (Brian Solis at Salesforce, Justin Gonzalez at Square, Colin Chow at 21st Century Brand) but this is a wrap-up episode that references prior conversations rather than featuring live interviews. The caliber is solid but not directly accessible in this particular episode for evaluation.
we've had the pleasure of interviewing leaders at brands like Square, Carta, Assembled, Salesforce, and many more.
We talked about empathy in a lot of detail in a recent conversation we had with Brian Solis, VP Global Innovation Evangelist at Salesforce.
The episode lacks concrete data, metrics, or named examples beyond a hypothetical hiking pants scenario. While guest names and company affiliations are mentioned, there are no specific outcomes, dollar figures, timelines, or quantified results from the prior 26 episodes that would substantiate the claims.
Let's say you're an e-commerce company that sells outdoor gear and a customer is shopping on your website for hiking pants.
You can set up a proactive conversational AI chatbot to make their life easier and reduce the customer's effort.
This is a solo host monologue without guest interaction, follow-ups, or productive disagreement. The host walks through pre-prepared talking points without challenging assumptions, exploring tensions, or asking hard questions that would emerge from genuine conversation.
We named this podcast Now Brands Talk because your customer's experience is a reflection of how your brand talks to them.
As we wrap up season one of Now Brands Talk, I'd like to reflect on some of the main themes that came up, which are empathy, empowerment, and holistic customer experience.
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
As we wrap up Season 1 of Now Brands Talk, we reflect on the main patterns that came up, which are empathy, empowerment, and holistic CX.
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
I can't believe it, but it was a year ago today that we published our first episode of Now Brands Talk. Since then, we've had the pleasure of interviewing leaders at brands like Square, Carta, Assembled, Salesforce, and many more. We've covered the big topic of customer experience from many different angles, including sales, marketing, brand, employee experience, and of course, customer support. Each conversation is rich with insights and lessons that leaders can start applying to their work today to deliver the kinds of experiences that customers are craving.
As we wrap up season one of Now Brands Talk, I'd like to reflect on some of the main themes that came up, which are empathy, empowerment, and holistic customer experience. Here are the full details in our wrap-up episode for season one. today we're putting a bow around season one of this podcast and i'd like to wrap up the year by reflecting on the top themes that came up in our 26 episodes empathy empowerment and holistic customer experience strategy. The first theme is the importance of empathy.
This one bubbled up the most and honestly doesn't surprise me at all. Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. And when we're talking about customer experience, there's really nothing more important than understanding how your customers are feeling and what they want or need at any given moment. And it's that lack of empathy that produces the most frustrating customer experiences, like getting passed around from one agent to another, having to deal with a clunky chatbot that doesn't understand anything, or being treated like royalty before you make a purchase, and then immediately ignored after a company has taken your money.
We talked about empathy in a lot of detail in a recent conversation we had with Brian Solis, VP Global Innovation Evangelist at Salesforce. So often as CX leaders, we are super familiar with all the technology and the processes behind the scenes that go into the customer experience But we then forget what the day experience is actually like for a real customer So when you designing customer experience it important to take a step back every so often and put yourself in your customer's shoes.
Ask yourself questions like, what does my customer want to do right now? How might they be feeling? How do I want them to feel? And what do I need to offer that takes all of the above into consideration?
So let's walk through an example together. Let's say you're an e-commerce company that sells outdoor gear and a customer is shopping on your website for hiking pants. They're browsing the selection across your website. First, what does this customer want to do?
Well, they're obviously trying to make a decision about which hiking pants they want to buy. How might this customer be feeling? I know for myself when I'm shopping online and there's a lot of selection, it's often really confusing. I have tons of options.
They kind of look the same online. I'm not really familiar with how the product lines are named differently or, you know, the unique terms that you use for different fabrics. And it gets overwhelming very quickly. As a CX leader, how do I want the customer to feel?
Well, we definitely want this person to feel guided and confident in their selection because my confusion as a customer about which hiking pants I want is likely going to lead me to not make a purchase. So as a CX leader and as a business, we want this customer to feel guided and confident in their selection so they're more likely to proceed to purchase the product. And finally, what do I need to do? As a CX leader, how can I best enable a customer to feel this way in this moment as they're interacting with my brand?
You can set up a proactive conversational AI chatbot to make their life easier and reduce the customer's effort. So you can have a chatbot pop up that says, what are you looking for? ask a series of follow-up questions that narrow down the options, and ultimately make a recommendation for the customer. That person didn't have to need to wait to talk to an agent.
They got an immediate, instant guide on what product is best for them, and they didn't even have to ask for it. In the case of a product recommendation, conversational AI is probably the best route for resolution But there are other cases where the best path forward is to connect that customer with an agent And that takes us to our second theme empowering your agents If you're effectively using automation to interact with your customers, that puts a premium on the conversations that your human agents are having with those same customers.
When your human team no longer has to answer those low value repetitive questions like how to reset a password, they're suddenly available to have more and more valuable interactions with your customers. Conversations that drive customer loyalty, revenue, and lifetime value. So the role of a CX agent has become that much more important because these individuals are now poised to have a much larger impact on the business. Many of the CX leaders that we spoke to shared how they've been able to invest in their team's professional development.
Listen back to our episode with Justin Gonzalez. He's the global head of customer empowerment at Square to hear about how his team has grown and evolved alongside their automation strategy. With this in mind, CX leaders should be striving to set their CX agents up for success. There should be a parallel effort to reduce effort for customers as well as for your human agents.
Brands that can improve the quality of an interaction for both the customer and the human agent on the other side of the chat are going to reap the benefits of happier customers and more impactful employees. Anna Skidmore, who's the VP of Customer Care at BFA, really said it best in her episode that driving CX forward requires a dual focus on both the customer and the employee experience. Our final theme from the year is the holistic nature of customer experience. While the term customer experience is often used synonymously with customer support, CX is actually the mandate of most teams in an organization.
Everyone plays a role, including sales, marketing, product, and support. Any and all interactions that a customer has with your brand contributes to one unique customer experience. Now, your customer is totally indifferent to where they are in your, quote, customer life cycle, or which team at your company owns them at a given point in time All they care about is that each interaction they have with their brand helps them get a job done So it absolutely essential for businesses, especially enterprises with large teams, to tear down silos and work together to design a unified, cohesive, consistent experience that puts customers at the center.
And that right there is the power of brand. Brand strategy is critical to align department leaders on a unified customer experience, drive consistency across teams, and make sure that that holistic effort is trickling down into the day-to-day work of individual contributors. Listen back to our episode with Colin Chow, Global Managing Partner at 21st Century Brand, to hear how this plays out practically in enterprise organizations. We named this podcast Now Brands Talk because your customer's experience is a reflection of how your brand talks to them.
We wanted to dive into that experience, into all the aspects of how your brand interacts from the perspective of many teams, including sales, marketing, brand, employee experience, and of course, support. In each conversation, we brought a new voice to the table to discuss a unique component of the customer experience. And every time we concluded with rich lessons and insights that leaders can start applying to their strategies today to deliver the kinds of interactions that customers are craving.
I really hope you've enjoyed season one of Now Brands Talk. Stay tuned here or follow Ada on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn to get notified when season two starts airing. In the meantime, if you'd like to send us questions or topics to dive into, you can always reach us at podcast at ada.support.
We'd love to hear from you. Thank you so much for listening in and supporting the show. See you in season two. You've been listening to Now Brands Talk, a podcast by Ada.
Stay connected by subscribing to the show, leaving us a rating and comment, and emailing us your feedback and questions at podcast at ada.support. Your support and feedback ensure future episodes will address your interests with fresh discussion and insight about how brands talk. Thank you so much for joining us.
Until next time.
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