As Forrester Research’s Customer Experience Forum continues on its second — and last — day here at the Grand Hyatt New York right next door to Grand Central Terminal, the sentiment here seems to be one of not if customer experience is necessary, but rather when — and how. Fostering a quality customer experience no longer seems to be a nice-to-have, judging by the tone and subject matter of the keynotes and other presentations here. Bruce Temkin, a vice president and principal analyst at Forrester, had a keynote address yesterday (my story on the speech is here) on the beginning steps companies should take.

In other news, Forrester announced the inaugural winners of their Voice of the Customer (VoC) Awards. Out of 40 applicants, only three companies took home the prize:

• Experian;
• Progressive; and
• Vanguard.

Speaking of “voice of the customer”, I sat in on a related track session yesterday: “Building a World-Class Voice of the Customer Program.” While the panel discussion was informative, I picked up on something rather interesting. Only one question in the entire 45-minute talk dealt with the literal audio of a customer conversation. Every other question asked by the attendees dealt with how to parse the information found in social media. This was not only evident to me, but also Natalie Petouhoff, a senior analyst at Forrester who sat with me at the session. Is this the direction VoC is taking? Are we glossing over speech analytics and going straight to social media? I’d love to get your thoughts on this.

Another question I have stemming from this conference: What exactly is customer experience? I haven’t found a catch-all, agreed-upon definition just yet. This is something I plan on exploring when I begin writing my December 2009 feature for CRM magazine on the topic, but I want to know what you believe it to be.

For our February issue on CRM in a recession, I had the opportunity to speak with Bruce Temkin, a vice president and principal analyst at Forrester. One point he emphasized was that if you’re going to cut your budget or staff, make sure it’s not executed haphazardly.

Sounds like a no-brainer, but it’s done more often than not. When companies are struggling with identifying areas to save money, many risk simply trimming “across the board,” Temkin says. “[They] get rid of all this stuff that’s going on, don’t invest in anything new and end up making a set of decisions that are inconsistent with any real strategy other than cutting costs,” he says. If that continues to be the company’s primary main motivation, the repercussions will be slightly (ok, severely) more painful. “It almost guarantees you a downward spiral, and you’re not in any position to come out of the recession with any positive momentum,” Temkin says.

So if you’ve been reading/watching/listening to the news, you’ll notice companies are certainly making some cuts to their employee base. Online retailer Zappos, for instance, cut 8 percent of its employees in November (but don’t worry, they’re standing by free shipping and free, 365-day returns) and just today, AT&T announced that it’s letting 12,000 employees go (or 4 percent).

Yet, despite these cuts, companies seem cognizant of Temkin’s advice:

Zappos has made a name for itself in the retail space — Its “Free Shipping & Free 365 Day Returns” is certainly a key differentiator and a core part of the company’s commitment to “unrelenting customer service.”

American Express released a statement at the end of October delineating its plan to “produce cost benefits of approximately $1.8 billion in 2009.” But of the cuts they are making, the company said it’s only focusing on areas that “do not interact directly with customers.”

AT&T’s 12,000-employee reduction is certainly no small number; but the company says that even so, it will continue to add jobs in wireless, video, and broadband “to meet consumer demand.”

Bottom line — don’t cut where you are/might/will be making the much needed dollars. Note the common theme, as well: all of them require astute attention to the customer.