Breaking Through The LLM Filters & Designing The Offer They Can’t Refuse

Summary

Experts of Experience: Breaking Through The LLM Filters & Designing The Offer They Can’t Refuse

Episode Overview

Host: Lacey Peace
Guest: Steven Van Bellingham
Release Date: June 18, 2025
Presented by: Salesforce Customer Success

In this thought-provoking episode of Experts of Experience, hosted by Lacey Peace from Mission.org, industry expert Steven Van Bellingham delves deep into the evolving landscape of customer experience (CX) amidst the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs). The conversation navigates through the pivotal role of branding in an AI-dominated world, the transformation of customer behaviors, and strategies for businesses to craft irresistible offers that resonate with modern consumers.

---

1. The Evolving Role of Branding in an AI Era

AI Filters and Brand Visibility

Steven Van Bellingham opens the discussion by addressing a critical concern: "What kind of brands will get through the AI filter? What kind of brands will be blocked by the AI filter? The role of branding will become more important than ever in this world of AI" (00:00). As AI platforms increasingly mediate consumer interactions and purchasing decisions, the ability of a brand to stand out becomes paramount.

Content Creation as a Branding Tool

Lacey Peace probes the importance of content creation, to which Steven responds, "The models look more for external advice than self-promotion" (00:12). This shift underscores the necessity for brands to generate authentic, third-party content that AI can leverage to recommend products credibly.

---

2. Customer Behavior Transformation Driven by AI

Shift from Traditional Funnels

Steven highlights a fundamental change: "What if the entire funnel happens on an AI platform where you don't have the possibility to advertise, where you don't have control over the kind of content that will show up about your brand or product? This is fundamentally different than what we're used to" (00:17). Traditional marketing funnels are being supplanted by AI-driven interactions, altering how customers discover and decide on products.

Rapid Adoption and Improvement of LLMs

Rose adds context about the surge in LLM usage: "There has been a 700% plus increase in LLM use for search since 2024... Google's global search market dipped below 90% for the first time in a decade" (01:24). This rapid adoption indicates a significant, albeit still nascent, shift in how people seek information and make purchasing decisions.

Implications for CX, Sales, and Marketing

Steven elaborates on the implications: "What does that mean for CX? What does that mean for sales? What does that mean for marketing? It changes where and how your brand appears to customers" (04:29). Businesses must rethink their strategies to align with AI-mediated consumer journeys.

---

3. The Future of AI Platforms and Sponsored Content

Adoption of Advertising Models in AI

A pivotal concern arises around monetization: Steven expresses disappointment, "I'm super disappointed... advertising completely messed up the Internet... I really hope that we're going to have a subscription-based player in the market... however, I'm afraid sooner than later we're going to have an advertising-based model in AI platforms" (23:59 – 25:44). The introduction of sponsored content within AI platforms could undermine trust and disrupt the current dynamics of CX.

Impact on Small Businesses

Lacey raises a vital question about the challenges small businesses might face in gaining visibility amidst dominant AI platforms: "Are small businesses going to struggle to get in front of the AIs?" Steven agrees, advising, "If you start a new business, you need to put more weight on the experience, less on the efficiency... create content that stands out" (26:27 – 27:49). Emphasizing unique customer experiences can help small brands gain traction.

---

4. Steven Van Bellingham's Background and Expertise

Personal Journey into CX

Steven shares his foundational experiences: "I got interested in CX from my parents who owned a small photography store. They always talked about their customers and how to enhance their experience" (07:30). His exposure to various technological shifts—from the advent of the Internet to the rise of social media—has positioned him at the forefront of CX evolution.

Professional Trajectory

His career spans academia, market research, authorship, and entrepreneurship. As a part-time marketing professor and founder of nexworks, Steven focuses on preparing companies for future challenges by organizing inspiration tours to innovation hubs like Silicon Valley and Shanghai (09:20).

---

5. The Impact of AI on Customer Experience (CX)

Internal vs. Customer-Focused AI Projects

Steven critiques the current trend where "90 to 95% of all AI projects are internally focused... everything linked to customers is the forgotten side of AI revolution" (13:19). While enhancing internal efficiency is beneficial, neglecting the customer-facing aspects of AI can leave businesses ill-prepared for the shifting consumer landscape.

Redefining the Sales Funnel

Steven envisions a future where AI platforms handle entire sales funnels: "Imagine having a personal AI shopping assistant that not only advises you but also completes purchases on your behalf... What will happen if you need batteries? What kind of brands will get through the AI filter?" (16:53). This paradigm shift necessitates a reevaluation of traditional sales and marketing strategies.

---

6. Predictions for the Future of CX

Personal AI Agents and Timeline

Steven anticipates the rise of personal AI agents within the next two to three years, facilitated by advancements in AI memory and seamless payment integrations (22:24). These agents will revolutionize how consumers interact with brands, making personalized, efficient purchasing decisions the norm.

Sponsored Content Concerns

While acknowledging the potential for sponsored content in LLMs, Steven remains cautious: "I really hope that they will not do that... but I'm afraid sooner than later we're going to have an advertising-based model in AI platforms" (23:59). This shift could dilute the authenticity and trust that consumers place in AI recommendations.

---

7. The Four Pillars of an Offer You Can’t Refuse

Introduction to the Framework

Steven introduces his proprietary framework: "If you want to create an offer you can't refuse for your customers, they expect a good product and good service (Pillars 1 & 2), convenience (Pillar 3), and being a partner in life plus adding value to society (Pillars 4 & 5)" (33:24).

Detailed Breakdown

1. Good Product and Service: The foundational expectation that customers have a high standard for the quality of products and services.
2. Convenience: Ensuring that acquiring and using the product is seamless and hassle-free.
3. Partner in Life: Building an emotional connection by adding value to customers' lives beyond the transactional relationship.
4. Adding Value to Society: Demonstrating corporate social responsibility and contributing positively to the community.

Company Examples

• Nike: Exemplifies all four pillars through quality products, convenient services, partnerships in fitness, and societal contributions like promoting women in sports (34:17).
• Centralbeher (Netherlands): An insurance company that goes beyond traditional offerings by assisting with home repairs and organizing community events like "little dent days" to enhance customer relationships (36:57).

---

8. Consistency Over Authenticity

Authenticity as an Overrated Concept

Steven articulates a controversial stance: "Authenticity is overrated because it's not inherently positive and is very rare. Instead, consistency in delivering positive experiences is what truly matters" (46:05). Drawing parallels with Disney's meticulously crafted customer interactions, he emphasizes the importance of structured, repeatable experiences over spontaneous authenticity.

Symbolism in CX

Using Disney as a prime example, Steven discusses how small, consistent gestures—like offering a free ice cream when a child drops theirs—create memorable and authentic-feeling experiences without being genuinely spontaneous (44:05). This approach ensures that every customer interaction reinforces the brand's commitment to excellence.

---

9. Leadership and Customer-Centric Culture

Top-Down Influence

Steven underscores that "70 to 80% of a customer culture is defined by the leaders of an organization" (54:26). Effective CX requires leaders to embody and consistently promote customer-centric values, ensuring that every team member makes decisions that prioritize customer satisfaction over short-term gains.

Micro-Decisions and Communication

He highlights the significance of everyday decisions and communications: "Consistency in micro-communication and micro-decision making is crucial for customer happiness" (57:22). Leaders must foster an environment where positive customer interactions are the norm, not the exception.

Addressing the 95.5% Rule

Steven introduces the "95.5% rule", which posits that while a small percentage of customers may be difficult, organizations should focus on serving the majority positively without letting a minority dictate overall customer perceptions (60:56).

---

10. Lightning Round Highlights

Favorite Customer Experiences

Steven cherishes experiences where employees exhibit genuine enthusiasm, transferring positive energy to customers. An example includes small business owners like butchers who personally recommend products with passion (61:27).

Pet Peeves in CX

A common frustration for Steven is inefficiency, such as closed registers at gas stations causing unnecessary delays (62:55).

Obsession with Technology

Despite his critiques, Steven relies heavily on ChatGPT for recipes, travel planning, and professional updates, highlighting its integral role in his daily life (63:50).

Inspirational Leaders

He admires Brian Chesky, CEO of Airbnb, for his customer-centric leadership and innovative approaches to enhancing CX (65:12).

Future of CX in One Phrase

Steven succinctly encapsulates the essence of future CX: "People want to be heard, helped, and seen. If you figure out a way to do that, even without AI, you're going to be good" (66:07).

---

Conclusion

In this episode, Steven Van Bellingham provides invaluable insights into how AI is reshaping customer experience and emphasizes the enduring importance of branding, consistency, and emotional connections. His four-pillar framework offers a strategic blueprint for businesses aiming to thrive in an AI-driven marketplace. As AI continues to evolve, the principles discussed serve as a guide for creating compelling, customer-centric experiences that stand the test of technological advancements.

Follow Steven Van Bellingham:

• LinkedIn
• Instagram
• TikTok
• YouTube
• Website

Transcript

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What kind of brands will get through the AI filter? What kind of brands will be blocked by the AI filter? The role of branding will become more important than ever in this world of AI.

[Lacy Peace]

Do you think content creation is going to become more important for brands?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

The model, they look more for external advice than self promotion.

[Lacy Peace]

Absolutely.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What if the entire funnel happens on an AI platform where you don't have the possibility to advertise, where you don't have control over the kind of content that will show up about your brand or product? This is fundamentally different than what we're used to talk about.

[Lacy Peace]

Loyalty builder, though.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What if this changes and what if the entire funnel happens on one platform where you do not have influence on those touch points? I think that's the most radical change we're going to see with AI. If you ask me, it's not about the big projects, it's not about the big things. It's about the 1000 small things that you improve for your customers and that's how they start to love you.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, that's amazing.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Every company is now focused on AI. All these AI projects are internally focused.

[Lacy Peace]

I haven't heard a lot of people talk about or want to tackle even the actual customer experience with AI. There's still this trust gap that people have where they're like, I don't trust it to talk to my customers yet. How is that going to change their behavior?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

The behavior of customers is changing rapidly. Imagine that tomorrow OpenAI tells the world, hey, we're open for business. Just share some money and we're going to have sponsored posts. Billions will flow in on day one.

[Lacy Peace]

Do you think there's a place for sponsored content in these LLMs?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I'm afraid, Lacy, that sooner than later we're going to have an advertising based model in AI platforms.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

And then everything changes.

[Lacy Peace]

Welcome back to Experts of Experience. I'm Lacy Peace, your host, and I have producer Rose on the other line with me. I have one thing I want to share with you, Rose, and I think you'll find this super interesting. There has been a 700% plus increase in LLM use for search since 2024. So in a year, people's use of, you know, ChatGPT, Claude, choose your LLM that you prefer has increased by more than 700%. So here's the flip side of that statistic that only covers 2 to 3% of global search. Okay, so like it's increased significantly but now it's at 3% in 2025. So we're not talking about not you know, 90% of people are using LLMs for search. 90% of people are still using Google for search. They. It might have dipped slightly below. Let's see. I think Google's at 89% of global search market, but it's still a massive amount though. That's the first time in a decade that they've dipped below 90%. So it is a. You know, times are changing. Yeah.

[Rose]

I just want to say something to anyone listening that primarily still uses Google. I really recommend switching to an LLM for first search. It's extremely sophisticated and I found it very reliable. I mean, even compared to a year ago. Lacy and I were talking about this earlier that a year ago. I remember kind of feeling like iffy about. It just felt like maybe ChatGPT specifically was getting. It was misinterpreting what I was saying. It was getting a little confused. Sometimes I had to kind of really have a full conversation with it, give it a lot of context to get good content from it. Fast forward to now, I could probably give it a fragmented sentence with most of the words misspelled and it will understand what I'm asking it.

[Lacy Peace]

Well, and there's other options besides GPT because I still find there are limits with GPT. Like I was asking, and my husband and I had a day together the other like two weeks ago and I was asking it for the best Bloody Mary place in Austin. And it presented all these options, but it, but it didn't show me. Even though I said I need it to be open right now, like Friday afternoon, it gave me options that were not open. So I had to go to Google because Google shows if the restaurant's open or not. So there's definitely still some things missing with GPT. But I think the thing that I find most fascinating and kind of the point of this is like it's changing rapidly. People are adopting it at a rapid pace and it's improving super quickly. And so like, what does that mean for cx? What does that mean for sales? What does that mean for marketing? What does that mean for this entire process of workflow that you maybe have optimized for Google, you've optimized for SEO, you've created a bunch of content that performs well there. And now this entire playbook that you've been using for years is changing and shifting and where you're going to be showing up and how people are going to be finding you and how your brand is going to be appearing to all your customers is changing dramatically.

[Rose]

Yeah, that's why it was so exciting to get to talk to Steven Van Bellingham. He was our guest today. We talked about everything from search to the four pillars every company should be paying attention to and hitting when it comes to excellent CX to how authenticity is a little bit of a. A myth, maybe something very overhyped in our culture right now. He's a keynote speaker, He's a professor and an author.

[Lacy Peace]

What I found so fascinating about what Steven shared is he's been at these pivotal points in technology with how customer behavior has changed. So, you know, he was at the forefront front lines of the Y2K movement whenever people went from not having the Internet to having the Internet. How did that change customer. Customer behavior? He was helping companies with social media management when social media started to come out. And now he's doing the same thing and asking questions around how is customer behavior changing in the era of AI and AI agents? So I think his like, through line of how customer behavior is being shaped by the technologies that we have and what their expectations are and how things are changing is super fascinating. And he shared a lot of amazing tips for brands who are trying to prepare for the next couple years. As, you know, LLMs become maybe the number one search tool for the world where personal AI agents exist and people are using those to buy their products instead of like going into a store or doing search on their own for a product.

[Rose]

Yeah, there's a lot of experts out there that understandably have trouble giving really concrete advice when it comes to preparing for AI because the technology is evolving so rapidly that it's kind of all theory too. Like, it kind of feels like it's happening right now and it's far away. It all feels very futuristic. So I found it really refreshing that Steven really got into the weeds of like, no, this is what this looks like. This is what preparing for AI actually looks like in practice.

[Lacy Peace]

He also shared his four pillars for an offer you can't refuse, which I won't tease all the pillars, but I guarantee two of them your business is probably struggling with. And you want to hear what he has to say about how to embrace those pillars and incorporate them in your company culture.

[Rose]

Before we let you guys get to the interview, please hit the like button, hit the subscribe button, head to Lacy's LinkedIn and just spam her comments section. Let her know exactly what questions you want answered. It's such a privilege to be able to get to sit down with these really cool executives and thought leaders in the space every week. So we want to hear from you.

[Lacy Peace]

And with that, here's Stephen Van Bellingham. Well, Stephen, welcome to the show.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Thank you, Lacy. It's a pleasure to be here.

[Lacy Peace]

Where are you calling in from?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I want our listeners to know I live in Belgium. I live very close to a wonderful city that is called Bruges.

[Lacy Peace]

Beautiful, beautiful. I want to visit Belgium so bad. It's been years since I've been. When I come visit, I'm going to tour your agenda. Yeah, exactly.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Of course, I'll be your private guide.

[Lacy Peace]

Thank you. Thank you. So, Steven, tell me, when did you first get interested in cx? Was there an aha moment for you when you were younger where you were like, I want to do this for my career?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I think I started to focus my career on CX about 15, 20 years ago. But when I do a deep dive in my personal history, I think I got that interest from my parents. My parents owned a small photography store in a very small town in Belgium. They had like three people working for them and I was always in that store. So I heard their conversations. We had lunch together when I came back from school. Looking back, I realized that they were always talking about their customers, always thinking about, how can we do more? What special thing could we organize here? And for me, that was like a natural way of life. And they talked about that every single day, every time we were together. And it's only when I ended up in the real world that I discovered that most people aren't like my parents and that a great CX is actually something exceptional. But I think I got that interest from them and their entrepreneurship and I'm still very thankful for that.

[Lacy Peace]

Oh, I love that. Were you a photographer? Did you help with the business?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Most of the time I was not. I studied economics, but when I was in university, my dad had back surgery that didn't go well, so he was out for three to five months. And then I had to step in and take some pictures. Like in Belgium you have the first communion and those kind of more Catholic kind of things. And then people take photo shoots of their kids. And that's when I stepped in to take some pictures of beautiful looking children ready for their communion. That was my first professional photographer experience. Also my last professional photographer experience. But I think I did well. My dad was happy with the result.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, yeah, that's great. Well, and take me through then from this experience as a kid, witnessing your parents, you know, seeing them be not only great leaders, but entrepreneurs. Where did you go from there? And like, kind of guide us to where you're, what you're doing right now.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

So I was very lucky with my parents to be part of their journey. I was also very lucky with my aunt, my dad's sister. She, she married the guy from California and then my grandfather wanted to visit his daughter and there was no one from the family who, who wanted to go along or who could arrange things with their job. So my parents said, why don't you take Stephen? And I was 13 then and I spent four weeks in the Bay Area with my, with my granddad and my aunt and uncle and I, I thought it was so cool. I really enjoyed it there so much that I came back to Belgium and I asked my parents if I could go back the next summer. But then without my grandpa, just by myself. And they let me go. And I spend about.

[Lacy Peace]

So when you were 14, you got to go to California by yourself?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Wow. By myself, Yeah. I jumped on a plane and my family was waiting for me on the other side of the ocean. And then I probably spent eight or nine summers between the age of 13 and 22 in California. And I got introduced to this whole Silicon Valley mindset and that enthusiasm and that looking to the future in a positive way mindset. And I got really into all that. So in the meantime I was studying applied economics in Belgium. But I started to do summer schools in UC Berkeley while I was in California. And there I did marketing and high tech marketing. That's how I got my interest in both the technology and customer experience. I graduated, started in a business school in Belgium, the Vlaerig Business School where I was a researcher. I'm still a part time marketing professor now in that business school a few days a year I teach there. And then I went into marketing research. So I started to study consumer behavior linked to the Internet. We're talking early 2000s now. So how does buying behavior change? How do people build their perception? Because of the arrival of websites and all that. Did that for 12 years. I was a partner in that firm, became a co owner and about 10 years later I had a story around social media and how people use social media and how you could increase your customer experience through social media. And after a presentation at a Microsoft event, someone asked me, why don't you write a book about this? Because this is a really cool story. And that's what I did in the summer of 2009, wrote a book in Europe that became quite a hit and that resulted in becoming part of the speaker circuit. I enjoyed that. I wrote the second book. I stopped my career at the market research company Became a full time speaker and author, realizing that my focus would be on inspiring companies to make their customers more happy. Then we started another company together with a friend called nexworks. And our goal with nexworks is to prepare companies for the day after tomorrow. And we do that by organizing inspiration tours, learning journeys. So we take entrepreneurs mainly from Europe to Silicon Valley, New York, Boston, Shanghai, Singapore, to do a deep dive into the innovation that is happening in those cities so that they can bring those learnings back to their organization. And yeah, in the past few years that's been a little bit my journey, really focusing on this inspiration, my core customer experience. So I do keynotes, I write a lot of books, we have next works. I invest in companies that are linked to customer experience. And I hope that I can continue this journey for a few more years because I really enjoy it.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, that's amazing. What a cool story. And lots of different connection points there. What I find really fascinating is you've been at these pivot points. You witnessed the change from consumer behavior when the Internet came to, came about when social media started to grow. And so now we're kind of at another, another pivot point with AI, AI agents. So I just kind of get, want to get a sense of what you're thinking around that change and where your head's at with AI.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, perfect. Happy to talk about that. And that's by the way, a very nice way to say that I'm pretty old. In the meantime, I went through all.

[Lacy Peace]

These, I mean it so lovingly.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. In general, of course, every company is now focused on AI. I meet a lot of companies and usually they do presentations before or after I do a talk. And then I see their list of AI projects. Every company has them. But what I see is that 90 to 95% of all these AI projects are internally focused. It's mainly about the increase in productivity, the increase in efficiency, which makes a lot of sense because there's a lot to be gained there. But there's also the forgotten side of AI is my feeling. And that's everything linked to customers. And that's where I try to focus on because I'm convinced while companies are really focusing to improve their own productivity, the behavior of customers is changing rapidly. Just look at the way how people search today. If they want to buy a new product, a lot of people don't go to Google anymore. A lot of people start their search on platforms like ChatGPT, where you have a conversation with a platform, it's advising you what to buy. Or not to buy, you have additional questions. It's like having a conversation with an expert salesperson that doesn't have a time limit for you. You can just talk with that system for hours. You can come back the next day if your wife or your partner has some extra requests and you keep on going until you know, okay, this is what I want to buy. Now imagine that agents will work as we hope they will work in the near future. Then you're not just going to inform yourself on these platforms, but you're also actually going to do the purchase or ask the system to make a purchase for you. And I find this really fascinating because this is a fundamental change in how people go through a sales funnel. A lot of companies still think in sales funnels we have to build awareness and then interest all the way down to conversion, which is fine, but that was how we were trained before. But what if the entire funnel happens on one platform? What if the entire funnel happens on an AI platform where you don't have the possibility to advertise, where you don't have control over the kind of content that will show up about your brand or product? This is fundamentally different than what we're used to. We're used to having all these touch points, making sure that we communicate at the right moment, at the right time, and then hopefully, if we do the right things, people will buy our product. But we can influence each touch point. We can do something ourselves on each of these touch points. What if this changes? And what if the entire funnel happens on one platform where you do not have influence on those touch points? That's that. I think that's the, the most radical change we're going to see with AI, if you ask me.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So just to kind of like summarize that, basically your feeling is that, like, 90% of AI projects that organizations are focusing on are internally focused. How can I increase efficiency for my employees? How can I make them more effective? Maybe how can I lower headcount or at least allocate, you know, the human resources that I do have to like these higher creative projects. But. And I've heard about that a lot on our show, I haven't heard a lot of people talk about or want to tackle even the, like, actual customer experience with AI. Um, it seems to be like a lot of people are focusing on these employee initiatives and not wanting to do. Because there's still like, this trust gap that people have with AI where they're like, I. I don't trust it to talk to, to my customers yet. But you're not really thinking about like, what kind of AI tool can I make for my customers? But how are they actually using AI outside of what I have? What's the ecosystem of how they're consuming it and how is that going to change their behavior?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, and you know, for organizations it's pretty easy to buy software. You can get software, you can make something to increase that efficiency, to lower headcount and so on. You can make something or create something to make customer service better instead of your call center. But at the end of the day, the customer service optimizations aren't always to make the customer's life better. Usually it's because they want to lower the costs of their contact center. So again, it's an efficiency gain. But if the decision making flow of a customer is changing, that means you have to change your entire marketing and sales philosophy to be successful in the future. And that's the forgotten side of this AI revolution.

[Lacy Peace]

Well, how do you think it's going to be changing customer behavior? You've touched on it a little bit, but I'd like to get into some of those details of like what your predictions are of, like what can sales and marketing leaders be thinking about or be doing or be planning for over the next several years?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Well, imagine that you want to buy toothpaste, just a very simple product. There's a big chance that maybe today you go to Amazon to get your toothpaste. Maybe in the future you have your personal shopping Assistant powered by OpenAI, for instance, where you say, hey ChatGPT. Or maybe you will give it a personal name because it becomes your personal shopping assistant. Maybe it's Jeff or Jim that you say, hey Jim, I need new toothpaste. Can you get it for me? And then maybe the system will say, hey Lacy, you want Colgate as you always had in the past few months? And you will say, yeah, of course. Or you will say, I need Colgate toothpaste. Can you get that for me? So very simple. Then the AI will give you the Colgate toothpaste because you specifically asked for it. The real question is, what will happen if for the first time you need batteries and you say, hey, AI platform, I need batteries. Then the question is, what kind of brands will get through the AI filter? What kind of brands will be blocked by the AI filter? So learning number one under discussed, if you ask me, is that the role of branding will become more important than ever in this world of AI because you want people to specifically ask for your brand. How do you build your brand in an age of AI by delivering better customer experience because the role of reviews, of influencers, of people who promote your brand will become more important because that will feed the LLMs so that they will promote your brand and that you will get through the filter. So you need to create this machinery of positive feedback so that the AI will pick up your brand for that consumer. This is also something that we underestimate today. When it's about AI, it's only about the technology. We should also talk about the role of branding, which will become more important than, than ever. We're going to, we're going to have two kinds of companies really soon. We're going to have companies that have the strongest lock in ever with their clients. I take Nespresso. If you have a Nespresso machine, you need new Nespresso. The machine will automatically reorder it for you and you won't even think about buying a different brand. So the lock in is stronger than ever. But for other brands it will almost be impossible to reach the customer because the shortcut of advertising will become harder. And we will outsource our decision making to a machine that will use the information on the Internet to make a decision for us. It will filter it in a way that we don't really understand, but we will trust it because we will start to see that the decisions that that machine takes for us are pretty accurate and pretty good. So we will have more and more faith and more and more trust in that platform, which means we're going to ask more, we're going to order more and it's going to become an endless loop of trust building if that algorithm does what it promises us that it will do.

[Lacy Peace]

So do you think content creation is going to become more important for brands in this like era where they need to be more front and center with branding? So that way there's more content for the LLMs to go search for and kind of discover with with these new companies.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, it's going to be important to have credible content. I don't think the answer here is to create more and more average quality content. What we're going to need is content created by third parties that tell the world how great you are. Because the models as you see it now, they look more for external advice than self promotion. A lot of the content marketing that we've done in the past years is self promotion and that's an alternative form of advertising. That's what it has become. And it worked fine in the early days of let's say the first 10 years of social media. Today that's harder because the LLMs will look for more credible sources to give their advice. So influencers will become more important reviews, real reviews by customers, journalists that write articles about your brand because you're doing something unique that's going to be more important than ever.

[Lacy Peace]

And what do you think the timeline is for all of this? Especially like personal AI agents? I don't feel like it's that far away. I already use, I've used GPT Operator to order things for me before. So like I don't think it's that far away that we've got our own personalized AI assistants that are doing most of the shopping for us. Deciding what to buy, when to buy it, when you know what you might need, how you might like it. Maybe there's like some specifications I can give it of like I really like organic food, I really like this kind of stuff and it just knows, okay, cool. This brand matches those priorities that you have. So like what's your timeline for these different rollouts? Even the idea that you had shared about the espresso machine that can automatically order for you, how soon are those things for us?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

There are a number of things that need to happen and that are starting to happen. First of all, the AI will need a memory that is stronger than today. It's starting to have a memory, but it needs a full fledged memory that it remembers everything that we share if we allow it to do that. Second thing is payment transactions need to happen. Flawless, super convenient. I think in the past month we had both PayPal, MasterCard, Visa saying that they will work together with OpenAI with operator to make sure that those payments just happen automatically. And then we're going to have an offering of other companies that step into this to facilitate it, to make sure that Nespresso works together with the platform so that it all happens in a flawless way. My feeling is we're talking about two, three years maximum because things are happening so rapidly. If you look at the amount of money that is going into places. Last week I think there was this memo that leaked from OpenAI where they shared their vision. It's exactly what we're discussing now that they hope will happen next year. But it's not because the technology is there that it's mass adopted by the average population. But the technology I think will be ready in a year, two, three years max.

[Lacy Peace]

Wow. So what about sponsored content? Because like whenever we use Google typically we've got little blurbs that pop up that say Sponsored or even on YouTube, you can see what's been promoted. Do you think there's a place for sponsored content in these LLMs? Like eventually there might be. Like I asked a question of GPT and it says, you know, this message was sponsored by Colgate or whatever.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, I really hope that they will not do that, but I think I'm too naive there. OpenAI already shared that they're investigating sponsorship deals.

[Lacy Peace]

Really? Okay.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

But yeah, I'm super disappointed about that because if you look back to the Internet, I think advertising completely messed up the Internet. It messed up social media. The reason why it's so dangerous and so bad today is because of that advertising business model. But it's the easiest way to make a lot of money. There are a zillion advertisers ready for that. Imagine that tomorrow OpenAI tells the world, hey, we're open for business. Just share some money and we're going to have sponsored posts. I mean, the billions will flow in on day one. So it must be super, super tempting to do that, but it would completely mess up the entire AI space again. I really hope that we're going to have a subscription based player in the market that has super high quality, where you have an objective voice that really, you know, has, has some trustworthy qualitative information for us if we want to make decisions in our, in our life or if we want to buy something. I'm convinced that people are willing to pay for that. There are already so many people who pay $20 a month now for ChatGPT. I guess you can stretch that easily to a higher amount or reach more people if you have that trustworthy content. Question is, of course, does that compensate for all the billions of advertising income that you will lose? It must be very, very tempting for them. So I'm afraid, Lacy, that sooner than later we're going to have an advertising based model in AI platforms.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

And then everything changes.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. And I get why you want to monetize and I understand that 100%, but I agree with you. I hope that doesn't happen. But hope may be naive since money flows in a certain direction. Right. I have another question kind of similar to this though, around small businesses. So like if I'm a small business and I decide I'm going to start a toy company, but like now, maybe in a couple years it'll be really hard to break into the market because I have to like teach the AI to make my toys pop up on the service in a way that like maybe Target or Walmart Just there's such a massive beast, their stuff's already popping up. So I'm curious if small businesses are going to struggle whenever, especially product based businesses over the next couple of years to get in front of the AIs.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, it's going to be, it's going to be more challenging. The shortcuts to finding new customers will be tougher to find. Maybe it will be gone forever. It's going to lead to an interesting discussion. Efficiency versus experience. Yeah, if you look at businesses today, most of them are more into or putting more effort into efficiency than into experience. Look at airports. Most of the airports in the world look exactly the same. Look at fast food places, they almost look exactly the same. Take away the logos and you don't see the difference. So a lot of the things that we use every single day are super focused on efficiency over experience. I think if you start a new business, you need to turn that around and put more weight on the experience, less on the efficiency. And by doing so you will stand out. You will have people that start to talk about you, maybe a journalist will pick you up as the new hidden gem that people need to discover. And by doing so you create content. And then people could say, hey, what are new cool places for toys? I need an original gift for my, for my little girl. And then you will pop up in that system. Yeah, but you need to do it differently than how people used to start a business in the past.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, that makes total sense. I went to a toys store again, I have a three year old son a couple weeks ago that was just amazing. Like you can get lost in this store. The people were so sweet and nice and there's toys I had never seen before and classic toys that you're like, oh, I haven't seen that in years. So there's definitely will still be that desire to go out, go buy something, go experience in, in a store, you know, something that is, is organic and interesting. So yeah, I definitely agree with you there.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

One thing that we know for sure is that people love shopping. Yeah, a lot of retailers are suffering but that has a lot to do with the price pressure because of E commerce. But, but in general, I mean if you're in the streets of any major city, stores are very successful. People love to spend time there, love to make it a family day out. So it's not that we were, not that we will stop going to stores. We thought that would happen with E commerce. Did not happen. Same with AI. It's not because we have this AI platform that we will not go to some beautiful stores in a wonderful city.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Which brings me to kind of another side of this equation. Right when we talk about customer experience and customer service, if, let's say 90% of things can be handled by AI, eventually maybe even 99% of things can be handled by AI, there's still going to be the 1%, like, something went wrong. I need help. I need to speak to a human. So what is that experience with an actual human going to look like in the future? Like, let's say I did order something online and I didn't get what I needed or it came broken, and I can't get that solved with whatever chatbot or AI agent that I'm working with. So I get on the phone or on a chat with a human. What type of humans are we hiring at that point? And like, what's. What skills will matter the most for those people?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, I love that question. I follow your reasoning. For 100%, 99% of the interactions will be online. We focus on efficiency. 1% when it's emotional, when it's super complex, when we're stuck, when a lot of money is involved, we may look for the comfort of a human. That means that that human will have to focus more on the emotional part of the conversation. Maybe the problem of that human is not so difficult to solve. But the fact that they want to talk to a human means that they're looking for emotion. It means that they go for experience over efficiency. You will have humans that are available for an unlimited amount of time today in customer service, they try to limit the time because another person is waiting. If 99% of the interactions are done digitally, it means the humans you have left have unlimited amounts of time. Probably the channel is going to be very diverse. Maybe you would like someone to come to the comfort of your own house. Maybe a phone call is not enough. Maybe other people would like to have a video chat. But we can let the customer decide for the channel. So it's going to be completely different. And basically all KPIs that we used to have in contact centers like efficiency, time spent on a call and so on and so on. We can just put them aside and just ask for one new KPI. How did you make someone feel after this conversation? And basically the goal is that people feel understood and heard and helped and that someone actually took the time to listen to their problem. That's the only KPI that is relevant at that moment when they want to talk to a human. Make sure that they have a feel good moment because of that.

[Lacy Peace]

How would you measure that? Is that like a form after someone's had an experience? Or is there maybe a place for AI to sort of analyze voice and tone and see if they're having a good experience?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

If you want to measure it, I think you can just, you can just ask. I still have the question that they used at Zappos. I know this is a traditional cliche answer, but when people call to the Zappos contact center after the call, they didn't ask, would you recommend? Or how satisfied are you? They said, if you would be the boss of a company, would you hire the person that just talked to you?

[Lacy Peace]

Oh, I love that.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I love that question. Because that tells you a lot more than, yeah, I was satisfied. Because satisfaction is not enough. If they specifically want to go to a human.

[Lacy Peace]

Yep. No, that's great. Well, and speaking of metrics, I like to ask this question of everyone that we talk to about KPIs, standard CX, KPIs, how many of like, which ones do you think are still going to be relevant in a couple years? Or which ones won't matter? And what new KPIs will we be looking at across the board, not just in contact centers in general.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What AI will do is create or should do is create the ultimate convenience. So if agents do things, if we have unlimited availability for help, it's the extreme form of convenience. So we can measure the effort score and it should be close to zero in terms of effort for a customer. I think that one is very relevant to measure that specific part of AI's value. The other one is about the power of the brand. So to what extent do you see brand love, to what extent do you see brand promotership is a crucial one because you want people to actively promote your brand. And I think those two will give you plenty of information. If you add an open field under that and say, what can we do better? What are tips that you have for us? And you do an analysis on that. I think that that should be plenty of information to improve everything.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, that's great. So switching gears a little bit, you had written up a structure called the Offer your Can't Refuse. And it's four pillars. And I would love for you to share what those four pillars are with the audience.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Of course. So if you want to create an offer you can't refuse for your customers, they expect a good product and good service. It's the bottom they expect convenience. They want things to be easy. That's number Two. And those two together are no longer differentiators. Those are like a minimum demand. People expect a good product and that they can buy it in a convenient way. Then you have two more that are differentiators. One is what I call partner in Life. That's about how to create positive change in the life of your customers. How can you be valuable in their life? And the fourth one is how can you create positive change for the world? How can you use the strength of your company to add value to society? That's number four. And if you bring those four together, good product, service, convenience, partner in life, adding value to society, then you have what I call an offer you can't refuse for a customer.

[Lacy Peace]

Can you give some examples of companies that have done this super well?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

There are not that many that do all of this super well. Maybe not everyone will agree with me, but a company like Nike is, I think, a good example. They have their cool products, good service, their website works well. Their stores are very conveniently organized. Partner in life, their partner in sports. Everyone can be an athlete. If you look to the apps that they develop, the content that they share, the technology that they created to help you with your workouts, they're really a partner in your healthy lifestyle. And they're adding value to society on the one hand, by making sure that people have a healthier life, which is value to society. They promote women in sports, for instance. If you think about their last ad during the Super Bowl, I thought that was super, super impressive. Where they put conversations on the table that are sometimes hard to have but are really valuable to have, and they have the guts to do these things. So they work on each four of these pillars to make a difference.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. Oh, that's great. Which pillar do you think most companies struggle with? Is there like a standard of the four that you think people struggle with, or is it all four that people are having a hard time with now?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I think companies spend less or the least amount of time on partner in life. Everyone's working on their product. Everyone knows that convenience is important. They don't always succeed in it, but at least it's on the agenda. But those two are transactional. They're rational. Right. It's about making sure that people can buy your product in an easy way. That's a rational part of the relationship. Most of the energy goes into that adding value to society. I mean, there are so many regulations, especially in Europe, around, for instance, sustainability, that companies have to invest in it. So they're. And then they're communicating about it. So they're trying to make a difference there. Most of them are not succeeding, in my opinion, to link that back to their strength and to their business so that customers see the value of that, but they're investing in it. The partner in life thing is a forgotten side. It's more emotional value, it's more understanding how people live and what you could do in that journey. And that seems to be very difficult for companies to understand because they're really focused on rationality, selling and they don't always see the value of creating this emotional link or they don't know how to do it. And that, that actually brings a form of belonging, a form of connection in your customer relationship that creates real loyalty, that creates, you know, repeat sales and so on and so on.

[Lacy Peace]

Are there any other companies that you would like to share that have like a good partner in life story or good examples?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, can I, can I give a few European examples? Is that okay?

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, I would love that.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Maybe some less known companies in the U.S. one that I love to work with is a company called centralbeher, which is an insurance company. It's an iconic insurance company in the Netherlands. It's 130 years old. Always a focus on customers. But now what they want to do is become a partner in mobility or a partner in living. So on top of their insurance products, they help you with fixing your house. If you have a problem in your house and you need someone to come over and fix it, they will facilitate that. Solar panels, they will make sure that you can do that in a way that it's safe and that it's okay. So they bring value beyond the insurance. And I love that because one of the problems with the insurance industry is that as a customer, usually the only interaction or communication you get from them is your annual invoice. Next to that. I mean it's radio science. If you don't have a claim, that's the only communication you get. They want to go beyond that billing relationship and really add value in the day to day life. Another one that they have that I really like is link to their car insurance. They found out that a lot of people sometimes have a little dent in their car or a tiny little scratch and then it's so small that they don't want to go to their insurance company or they don't want to waste time or money on it. So after a while your once beautiful looking car is now less beautiful because you have a dent here and there. They organize, they call it the little dent days in the Netherlands. And then their customers can go with their car. And for free, they fix up to three little scratches or three little dents because you're their client and they give you a snack. There's their company band playing. Yeah. And the cool thing is everyone who welcomes you and. And does, you know, the whole event, they're all employees of that company. It's not some event agency, and it's not the sales or service people. It's actually the people who are working in the back office that are then invited to help customers and to meet customers in real life. So, you know, it brings value beyond the product. It's feel good. It creates a culture of empathy because everyone is involved and, you know, they have plenty of those stories. And I just love it how they do that.

[Lacy Peace]

Talk about loyalty builder, though. Like, if I had an insurance company that did that, that, you know, had a dent day and I got to meet them and I got to put faces with names and kind of like, have some laughs, have some giggles, have some snacks with people. I mean, I'm never going to change from that insurance company.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

No, exactly. And they do you a favor by making your car look good again without additional cost.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. That's just so thoughtful. I mean, how does a company go, like, change their culture to kind of embrace that mindset? Because so many companies, especially in the US have this, like embedded mindse, like, you know, profit. Just get something built, make sure it's good, get it out there. You know that those first two points of have a good project, make it convenient. Right. How do we get people to sort of flip the narrative, think a little bit differently, and get to those other two pillars that you've talked about?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Well, I was this insurance company that I talked about. I was there at that moment. It was about five or six years ago. They invited me to give a talk to their entire team. And before me, their CEO spoke. And he came on stage and he said, guys, I'm super disappointed. This is our net promoter score here, and it's seven, which makes us the most successful one in the insurance company because typically insurance companies have a very bad net promoter score. So they were best in class. But he said, this is terrible. We're the best of the worst. So what I want is I want to have a score that is as high as the most successful theme park here in the Netherlands, which is called the Efteling. They had a net promoter score of plus 50. He says, I want to have that as well. Wow. I looked at that audience. So there were you have to imagine there were like 3,000 people sitting there. And I saw half of the room thinking, he's crazy, he's not fit for the job. We're an insurance company, we're not in a theme park. The other half was super excited because they understood if we want to achieve that goal, I mean, he didn't say we need to go from 7 to 15. He said, I want to go to 50. So if we want to achieve that goal, we radically have to rethink the way that we go to market. We will have to rethink everything. And they became super excited and they just started, that group of enthusiasts. They started and they looked at every journey. They started to change things, just small improvements. And now we're five or six years further in time and they actually have a net promoter score that is higher than 50. And if you ask their CEO, how did you do it? He will say 300 to 1,000 small changes. It's not about the big projects. It's not about the big things. It's about the 1000 small things that you improve for your customers. And that's how they start to love you.

[Lacy Peace]

Are there any examples that are top of mind for you from that that you could share besides, like the dent day, which is amazing, but is there anything that maybe is just some smaller thing that they decided, we're not going to have call centers do this or we're not going to communicate with people like this. What were the small change that you might be able to share?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, they looked at all automated emails, for instance, when people didn't pay the bill or when, I don't know, when all the automatic stuff that goes out. Usually those are emails that have been used for years and no one looks at them anymore. No one receives them. It just happens. And if you then look at them, you're like, oh, my God, this is. This copy is terrible. It's so aggressive or it's negative. So they changed that. That was one project, for instance. They changed the narrative when people called them. They made sure that people were not under pressure in terms of timing. They printed little note cards that were just next to every contact center agent. And if they heard something that you know, that they could talk about, they wrote a little handwritten card. And every day they send out hundreds of these handwritten cards. All these small things. Yeah.

[Lacy Peace]

Wow. Well, and that makes it like so much more fun too, as an employee. Get to really think about, oh, how can I connect with this customer? How can I brighten their day? And it just Makes you feel more fulfilled.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

It's positive energy. I like to work with a concept that I call symbols of customer experience. For me, symbols of customer experience are small things that you do that don't cost a lot of money, but they put a smile on people's face. And if you do it in a smart way, you can even organize it and structure it that it almost takes no effort for you as an organization and maybe the best in the world here is Disney. And I know Disney is huge and they make billions of dollars and all of that, but they are experts in symbols of customer experience, like the Disney ice cream rule. You know what happens, right? You go with your child to a Disney park, they want an ice cream. Of course you buy that ice cream and then they drop it, and then tragedy unfolds itself.

[Rose]

Yes, yes.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

As a parent, you don't know what to do. You look in the parent manual, you don't know what the best solution is. But in Disney, they have this Disney ice cream rule that is very simple. It says that every employee, no matter what your job is, every employee, if you see thing like that happen in an incident like this, you only have one priority left in life. You give that child a new free ice cream that's a symbol of customer experience. Or like with the balloons, imagine that you buy a balloon for your three year old and then they carry the balloon, but they want to go on Small World. The balloon is not allowed on the ride, so you have to leave the balloon there. By the time that you come back, you don't just get the balloon back. You will also have this little cart that will say, oh, while you were gone, the balloon had such a wonderful time. He ate a snack, he played with other balloons. I even think they were singing Let it Go together with all the balloons. It was. It was fantastic. Fantastic. See, small things that put a smile on people's face and it's basically no effort. Or my favorite is the Disney hugging rule that says that if a child approaches a character, the child will decide when the hug is over. So if your 3 year old wants to hug Princess Elsa for 45 minutes, then that is exactly what will happen. Because the child decides when the hug is over. And those are all small things. They don't cost any money, they don't cost any effort, but they put a smile on people's face. And I invite every company to think about their own symbols of customer experience. What are your symbols of customer experience? And if you don't have them, create them, structure it and you will Be surprised what the impact is of those very small, organized measures.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. Oh, those are so good. Those are so good. Well, speaking of Disney, this is a great segue to something that you shared with me on last time we chatted was about authenticity. Right. And you use Disney as an example, but you have a, I'd say strong, correct me if I'm wrong, strong opinion about authenticity, that authenticity is overrated. So tell me a bit, a bit about that and why you feel that way.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. This is a very sensitive topic because people can become angry because of that. Yeah, I believe authenticity is overrated because authenticity has been a buzzword in marketing for years. And what I don't like about it is that authenticity is by definition a positive thing. For me, authenticity is not by definition a positive thing. Like Hitler was pretty authentic, but it wasn't a positive figure for the rest of the world. So it's not by definition positive. That's the one thing. The second thing is it's very rare that you meet someone that is truly authentic. And that creates positive energy and a great flow. There's an enormous amount of scarcity if you only focus on authenticity. And a few months ago, I was in Seoul, in Korea, in South Korea, and they talked about, and they're super proud of it. They talked about the K Force, Soft Power, where they wanted to make South Korea more popular in the world, both for students and for tourists and everything. And they do it through Soft K Power. So it started basically about 10 years ago with this song, Gangnam Style. I don't know if you remember this. I think this was the first video on YouTube with more than 1 billion views. And this went all around the world. And then they were like, oh, this seems to work. We have this songwriter, he has a song, and everyone's now singing in Korean. We need to do something with this. And then they start to organize it. So basically they looked for people that were good looking, that could dance a little bit, that could sing. They trained them in specifically designed dance studios. And then they made bands out of this. Like TBS is a good example of that. Super popular, but not authentic. They were artificially created. A huge, huge success, not just in Korea, but like Coldplay had a song with them because they understood their popularity. They have Squid Game, which is one of the most popular shows on Netflix. The Masked Singer is created in Korea. All of these are examples of artificially created experiences that a lot of people in the world actually love but are not authentic. And if you think about it, or I was thinking about it, Some of the most successful customer experience things that can happen to you are usually artificially created. Take a Disney Park. There's nothing authentic about the Disney park, but it's super, super successful. Take a Coldplay concert. You need to take a day off to buy tickets for their concert. It's not authentic. It's a very well defined, professionally created show that is state of the art. And because it's not authentic, it's so good. If they would let Chris Martin just be authentic with his band, but no fireworks, no lights. I mean, it would be super, super. Not boring, but it wouldn't be the same impact that it has now.

[Lacy Peace]

Absolutely, yeah.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

So because of that, I think authenticity is overrated. It's good if you can have it, but it's so scarce that it hardly ever happens that I believe companies should focus more on artificially created experiences because a lot of people seem to like that.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah, well, and that kind of ties back to this, the CX rules that you had shared that Disney has. Right. You know, you got a hug until the kid wants to let go. That's artificial because it was something that was told to the employee to. To do, but it creates an authentic experience for the person. Like whether or not exactly that was authentic. I authentically am experiencing it.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. And it's consistent. And you could say, yeah, but that's so obvious, Stephen, that you tell them to give them a new free ice cream, but it's not, because if you don't explicitly tell your team that, a lot of people will be afraid to give a free ice cream to a client because you're actually giving away money from your employer to a customer and the customer made a mistake. So a lot of people will be afraid to do it. So if you let things authentically happen, half of your team will give a free ice cream, the other half will not, which is super confusing for a customer. Yep.

[Lacy Peace]

Yep. Yeah, for sure. Rose, do you have any questions before I go on?

[Rose]

I do, yes. Authenticity is one of those buzzwords that you hear all the time. So, and this may be like an oversimplified question, but what word would you replace if you could remove authenticity from the zeitgeist in reference to cx, what word would you want to replace it with?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Consistency. I think customers value consistency of positive consistency much more than authenticity.

[Rose]

The only other actually question I'm curious about, I've been listening to a lot of these interviews, and I've heard a lot of people compare the cultural reaction to AI to Y2K and kind of the Inception of the Internet. And I wanted to get your perspective on that. If it feels like similar to you, if it feels like it can even be compared, or if it feels like this whole other. And even with the fear, that's kind of coming along with a lot of the conversations around AI and similar to maybe what people thought, how consumer behavior would change back in Y2K era. How would you compare them or can they be compared?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

There's a big difference between Y2K and what's happening now is my feeling. Back then, most people did not believe that the Internet would be something. You had, of course, the believers and the hype. But then you had the dot com crisis. So a lot of people lost a lot of money and the media was like, the Internet is gone, it's not going to happen. Most people didn't see the value because the access to it was difficult. I mean, most people didn't have broadband connections yet we didn't have mobile phones where we were connected with the Internet. Quality of websites was very, very low. It was like a PDF file that was an online page. So the amount of believers were very low. The media was pretty negative if you look now, I mean, unless that has changed in the past few months. But I believe that ChatGPT is the tool that has the highest and fastest adoption in the history of human beings. The media is like, AI will not go away. This is it. Every company in the world understands if I'm not doing AI, I'm going to be in trouble. Back in Y2K and also with social media, a big part of what I did was convincing people that it was actually happening. Now with AI, you don't have to convince people, they want to know how do I need to do it, what do I need to do? Help me to do this faster. Because if I don't, I'm going to lose track of things. So the wave, the belief, the urgency is much, much higher than back then.

[Rose]

Have you seen more hope relative to AI rather than fear?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I see both. I see of course the whole AI community, the tech community is super bullish, is super excited. But I also see a lot of people who are super against it, who are afraid that the human connectivity will disappear. A lot of people who are afraid of jobs, a lot of people who think, I won't be able to keep up with this, how will I have to do this? So because of the fact that everyone understands that this will become part of our day to day life in the next couple of years and that it will be fundamental, creates More fear than the fear of a website. Back in the days when we said Amazon could be destructive for your business. If you're in retail, I mean people will buy books, but next to that they won't buy anything. I mean that was the kind of tone of voice that you had today. Everyone is really vigilant and really worried that they will have a negative effect if they don't do the right things, both individually as businesses. So that's a big difference as well.

[Lacy Peace]

There was one other thing that you mentioned last time we chatted about this like trust deficit in CX leadership. So you know, you have the CX leader come in and they don't have much rapport or credibility with their team. So I would like to hear from you why you feel that way and yeah, like what it might take for a CX leader to appear strong and actually lead their team.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Well, thanks for this question and I would broaden it a little bit. It goes beyond CX leaders. It's about leadership.

[Lacy Peace]

True.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

70 to 80% of a customer culture is defined by the leaders of an organization. Everyone who leads a team has an impact on how customers feel. And it doesn't matter what that team is, it might as well be it or accounting invoicing. Everyone plays a role there. Most leaders believe that they're customer centric because once a year or every six months they give a presentation to the team or the organization where they say customer centricity is one of our key values. And then they share the net promoter score or something like this and then they move on to the next value and then they believe that they gave the order or the message that people need to be customer centric. Doesn't work like this. People will start to act in a customer centric way because of the micro decisions and the micro communication on the floor every single day. It's when you have a conflict of interest. How will your leader decide? Will they look for the short term gains for themselves or are they willing to hurt themselves to gain trust in the long run? The kind of decisions that you take on a moment like this that defines how customer centric your team will be. Or imagine someone from a team did something extraordinary for a client. They helped the client in need, even compensated a little bit. So great job. That employee gets an email saying, fantastic, I'm super happy with this. I'm your most loyal client ever. That email gets spread in the organization. The leader of the team sees it, says, oh, this is a cool email. Goes to the employee, says congratulations, this is what we Need. Look everyone, this email, Amazing. Congratulations. Very well done. Just one small thing. That compensation that you gave that customer, maybe you need to be careful there because you understand we cannot give this to everyone. But next to that, very well done. The leader believes that he or she congratulated the team member. The team member only remembers ha, he or she is sad or angry with the compensation I gave. So I'm never going to do this again. And leaders need to be very aware of that, that microcommunication and micro decision. Because if someone from the team has to choose between having an angry customer or an angry boss, they will always prefer an angry customer over an angry boss. Because an angry customer is annoying. If they're really angry, you never see them again. An angry boss is dangerous. They stick around and they can have a big influence on the future of your life. So there's no doubt in the employee's mind if they are afraid that the boss will be angry at them for a certain decision, they will never do it. So the consistency in microcommunication and micro decision making is crucial for customer happiness.

[Lacy Peace]

But how do you learn that? Like if you're a leader, how do you realize, oh, I'm doing this wrong or I should be doing it this way? Or how does an organization help train their leaders to think a certain way?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, you have to grow into that. Some have it naturally, but that's a minimum. Because reality is all of those leaders get evaluated as well. And usually that's based on short term financial gains or efficiency gains and so on. So they do whatever they can to achieve those goals because often that's linked to financial personal benefits. So it's very human to follow that, to follow that. So this is where the senior leadership, the top management steps in. They need to make sure that that customer mindset is a priority and train and coach the middle managers to make sure that they understand that and that they move them in a certain behavior so that they will actually do that and lead by example. There work with concrete case studies like if this happens, what are we going to do? If this happens, what are we going to do? A lot of companies follow this reasoning that I'm sharing now, but they're afraid about the exceptions. You know, they say, yeah, of course we want people to help and compensate clients when it makes sense, but sometimes there's so much money involved and we cannot take that risk, so that's why we don't do it. And I get that you can organize, that you can tell your team, look, guys, for everything that is lower than $100 and in other businesses lower than $5,000, depending on the ticket sizes that you sell. Do whatever it takes to protect the relationship. We support you. When it's more, we're still going to protect that relationship. But let's have a five minute discussion here to see what we should do. Because there's so much money involved, we don't want to risk the future of the company because of one incident we had, of course. So sometimes they block because they want to tackle everything that could potentially happen. Whereas you can make your life easier by just taking average and then having discussions discussed later on.

[Lacy Peace]

And it's definitely so top down. If your senior leadership and upper management are not thinking that same way, then the mid level management will not think that way because the incentive structure will be completely flipped and wrong. So I definitely feel that, that it needs to come from the top and trickle down and anything that the top leadership is doing will eventually make its way to the people that are communicating with customers.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I work with what I call the 95.5percent rule to help companies there. It's the idea that every company has customers that are terrible people, that don't pay the bills, that are toxic in their communication, that cannot be trusted. Basically every company has those. But it's usually a very small part, small portion of the customers, maybe 1 or 2 or max 5%. And the problem is not that 5% terrible people. The problem is that our brain cannot deal with that 5%. We give a lot of weight to that kind of negativity. We talk about that with each other and so on. And after a while you start to think that the 5% equals the average customer. And then something typically human happens. You want to protect yourself against the 5%. And you do that by changing the rules and procedures to protect yourself against the 5%. You make it harder to work with you. But what you're actually doing is you're punishing the 95%. So I try to invite leaders to understand that and to let them find the mental strength and coach each other to focus on the 95% and take decisions and install procedures for the 95% and deal differently with the 5%. But don't try to protect yourself to the 5% by punishing the 95. That's a crucial mental strength that you need to find to go to the next level.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. Oh, for sure, for sure. Well, Steven, this has been so much fun. We have one more fun thing for you. I'm gonna hand it back to Rose. Who has our lightning round? And she's gonna pepper you with a few questions. The goal of the lightning round is to answer as fast as you can, but feel free to take a minute if you need to think about it or you have an explanation.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

And short, I assume. Short.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah. I mean, as short as you can make it.

[Rose]

For sure.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay, Rose, I'm ready for you.

[Rose]

All right, awesome. So our first lightning round question is what's an everyday customer experience you personally love? Something that always puts a SM your.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Face as a customer enthusiasm. I love it when you feel the enthusiasm of someone who works somewhere of their own business. And because the cool thing is people can transfer positive energy. And if I can feel positive energy, that's what I love. Not perfection, but the intention to make a difference.

[Rose]

Do you have a good personal example of that? Like a company that you'd want to shout out?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I noticed that a lot with small entrepreneurs where you have the owner who has, you know, we have this butcher here. They're also friends of mine, but they have the best quality meat in a white district. And I'm super happy that I have them in my life. But every time when I go into their shop, they're like, oh, steven, we have something new. You want to try it? And I'm sure you're going to love this. This is a recipe that could work well. And then I'm like, I'm like the easiest customer in the world. And I'm like, hey, Dominic. His name is Dominic. Dominic. You know what I'm going to say? Just add it to my list. I want to try it. But if they are enthusiastic and they come with special things, for me, I'm such an easy victim for all that.

[Lacy Peace]

Yeah.

[Rose]

Personal connection is a hard thing to say no to as a customer if you feel seen like that.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, I love that.

[Rose]

That's a good one. All right. Kind of on the flip side, is there a customer experience pet peeve that you have, like, as a customer, something that might happen or maybe even a pattern that you've seen in companies that struggle with customer experience or prioritizing it? That's a particular pet peeve of yours?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. Well, it's super simple, but I hate it when I see it. Like in gas stations, when there's a long line at one register and there's a second that is closed and there's a person behind that doing something that I think is irrelevant at that moment and is refusing to say, hey, you can come here as well. And we're going to Split the line in two. Just that common sense of understanding. My priority is now. Now is to help those people. My blood starts to boil when I see that.

[Rose]

Yeah, that's true. The mentality of whatever task you're working on can wait.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What is your priority?

[Rose]

Right, yeah. People don't. And the wave of busyness that you might experience, it's. In the short term, you'll have an opportunity to get back to your task.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Exactly. Yeah.

[Rose]

Prioritize the people. That makes sense. All right. Is there an app or technology that you're currently obsessed with that's making your experience as a customer more enjoyable or more convenient?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I think this is going to be a cliche answer, but ChatGPT is the one thing I use all the time now. I can't imagine not having that tool in my life anymore.

[Rose]

What's your top? Like, what do you go to ChatGPT for first? Like, I've been going to it a lot for my grocery list. I'll give it a budget, I'll give it a few recipe ideas. I'm vegetarian, so I'll tell it that. And then it'll give me a grocery list option at the grocery store right by my house.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah, well, I use it for recipes. I'm an amateur chef. I love to spend a lot of time in the kitchen. So it's now my partner in the kitchen. Also travel a little. We travel a lot. So itineraries, hotels, restaurants, activities. So I spend a lot of time on our family vacations. And now I have the best partner there. And also professionally. So, like every day I ask for the latest news in my area of expertise. It's easier, faster, better than me spending hours on Google, going through links, going through news articles. It's just I get it on a plate in front of me. So it's super, super convenient.

[Rose]

That's a good one. I should do that every morning. Just kind of within your sector. Just say, what's going on? What do I need to know?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

What do I need to know?

[Rose]

Who is someone in business or beyond that inspires your approach to be, well, to be constantly focused on customer centric innovation.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I'm a big fan of Brian Chesky. He's the founder and CEO of Airbnb. Unfortunately, I haven't met him, but I listen to a lot of the podcasts where he's a guest and I really love his approach. He's like, for me, really an example of a customer leader. He spends time on his own platform. He lets people stay in his own apartment. They have very cool you know, mind stretching exercises to go to the next level of customer experience. Yeah, I would love to meet him. I think he's super inspirational.

[Lacy Peace]

I love his 11 star guest experience. We've done that as a company, the eleven star guest experience. So I love him. I love everything he has to share.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah. Cool. Did you have a chance to interview him?

[Lacy Peace]

No, but we have to add him to the list. Rose.

[Rose]

Not yet. We'll add them to the list for sure.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Yeah.

[Rose]

All right, last lightning round question.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Okay.

[Rose]

If you had to describe the future of customer experience in just one word or phrase, what would it be?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Very simple. People want to be heard, helped and seen. And it's. The conversation is way too often about the tools and the technology, but in the essence, you know, and this is a crazy thing, in the beginning, Lacy and me, we talked a lot about AI and it feels like everything is changing, but at the same time, nothing is changing. The tools are changing, the platforms, but at the core, people want to be seen, heard, and helped. And if you figure out a way how to do that, even without AI, you're going to be good. That's what people want. And it's so simple. But a lot of companies fail in doing it.

[Rose]

Awesome. That concludes the lightning round. Thank you, Steven.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

Sounds great. I love this. Thanks. Thanks, Rose.

[Lacy Peace]

Thank you, Rose. All right, Stephen, thank you so much for joining us on Experts of Experience today. Where can our audience find you to follow you so they can stay in touch?

[Steven Van Bellingham]

I share a lot on LinkedIn. LinkedIn.com my name. I share a lot on Instagram. TikTok. Where else? YouTube. Yeah, those are my channels. And my contact information can be found on my own website, stevenvanbellagam.com awesome.

[Lacy Peace]

We'll drop all those links in the show notes for anyone that's curious. You can follow Stephen. Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Stephen.

[Steven Van Bellingham]

No, it's been a pleasure. I'm honored that I was invited, so thank you. This is a very cool show. I enjoyed our conversation, so I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.