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Principal Analyst Kerry Bodine provided the Forum audience this morning with an overview of what makes great customer experiences.  It requires employees with the right skills to build these experiences, processes to drive them forward, and an organizational culture ruthlessly focused around the consumer.

For marketers at companies just starting on a path towards customer-centricity, Kerry provided these first baby-steps:

1) Make this your mantra: “truly understand customer needs”

2) Look at your Web analytics log files

3) Listen to your customer service calls — Find out what problems customers are reporting, and what kind of experiences they’re having with your call center.

4) Bring your customers in for usability testing — this can be simple and informal

5) Observe your customers in the wild — “channel you inner anthropologist”