Customer strategy

Putting customers first, building value that lasts

Why leading companies are prioritising customer strategy

Consumer insights. Data analytics. Digital marketing. Personalisation. Artificial intelligence. Omnichannel experiences. Design thinking. As digitisation continues transforming all aspects of your business, understanding your customers—and exceeding their expectations with your core capabilities—is increasingly important. In collaboration with the frontline teams at PwC, we help clients strategically plan the right mix of business, experience, and technology to drive actionable change from the very start of our engagement, and deliver results that redefine your business for years to come.

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How we help clients

Customer and experience strategy

Companies must strike the right balance between generating value for the customer and value for the business. To do that, we help clients evaluate their overall customer landscape, determine which segments they should focus on, and then consistently engage with those customers in every interaction across products, services, solutions, and brand messaging.

Service offerings include:

  • Customer growth strategy

  • Customer segmentation

  • Experience strategy and design

  • Value proposition development

  • Digital customer insights and analytics

Marketing and sales

In the age of experience, we help clients take advantage of the most important digital trends and tools to integrate strategy, customer insight and analytics, experience design, and technology. We strive for marketing and sales excellence that enables innovation, supports “always on” customer engagement and go-to market strategies, and drives the bottom line.

Service offerings include:

  • Marketing strategy and operating model

  • Portfolio and brand management

  • Sales force strategy and effectiveness

  • Channel and RTM strategy

  • Sales organisation design and alignment

  • Digital marketing and commerce strategy

Service and engagement

Information is everywhere, experiences are integrated across channels, and individuals expect immediate customised responses. As these dramatic social and technological realities create new roles for customers and companies, we partner with clients to help them transform their digital and physical services so that they can thrive in this fast-changing market with the right strategies and organisational approach.

Service offerings include:

  • Service strategy and revenue growth

  • Omnichannel experience

  • Contact centre optimisation

Pricing and profitability

Achieving superior pricing and margin management requires capabilities that blend mathematics and managerial science. More than ever, companies need a holistic pricing strategy that starts with the end-user, leverages a growing number of data sources, and reflects value delivered and received by channel partners. We work with clients to build the pricing strategies and capabilities that support profitable growth and optimise value capture.

Service offerings include:

  • Pricing and revenue model strategy

  • Customer portfolio profitability and optimisation

  • Trade promotion, rebate, and discount effectiveness

Customer analytics

The key to understanding customers is getting the right insights. We support customer strategies with advanced quantitative and qualitative research techniques, leveraging big and little data to inform complex marketing, sales, pricing, and channel decisions.

Service offerings include:

  • Consumer insight

  • Marketing analytics

  • Sales analytics

  • Big data and digital analytics

Impact

Beverage maker uses loyalty to drive revenue

Beverage maker uses loyalty to drive revenue

A beverage maker wanted to enhance its customer experience strategy and develop a more personalised loyalty programme. Strategy& created journey maps, assessed opportunities to transform its digital organisation, and evaluated more than 25 loyalty programme elements. As a result of our work, the client is now delivering a seamless experience across all channels, its customers’ mobile purchases increased by 22 per cent, and its membership and loyalty are estimated to be up double digits over the next five years.

Jewellery manufacturer finds headroom for growth

Jewellery manufacturer finds headroom for growth

A leading jewellery manufacturer wanted to create a new, consumer-centric market segmentation to better understand customer attitudes, identify new market opportunities, and align its offerings to its target customers. Strategy& took a market-back approach to understanding consumer preferences, working with company data, leveraging market research, and conducting sophisticated analytics around consumer preferences. As a result of our work, we uncovered five distinct segments for which we recommended specific brand positioning options. The client is projected to achieve two to three times its absolute sales growth and make improvements in net margins of between 10 and 15 per cent.

International telco expands into new markets

International telco expands into new markets

Approaching an expansion into eight new markets, an international telecom company wanted to more systematically and strategically allocate its marketing spend across geographies. Strategy& delivered a clearly defined analytical and statistical framework, a tangible set of dashboards to properly measure the ROI on marketing spend, and a detailed evaluation of vendors best suited to deliver against this vision. Our efforts resulted in a nearly 3 per cent efficiency gain in marketing spend over three years.

Major retail bank drives utilisation of digital products

Major retail bank drives utilisation of digital products

A major bank launched a customer acquisition initiative to better understand how to engage customers, as well as to leverage social media channels in their promotional mix to drive utilisation of digital products. Strategy& used a combination of social listening and analytical techniques to generate insights and identify opportunities to use social media to promote products and enhance customer engagement. Our work resulted in a distinct and measurable social media strategy linked to the existing marketing strategy and a five-pronged implementation plan.

Wealth management firm drives customer acquisitions

Wealth management firm drives customer acquisitions

A wealth management firm with brokers across the United States wanted to capitalise on digitisation to spur customer engagement and growth. Strategy& identified three digital initiatives to acquire new affluent households over three years: developing a new prospect database, tailoring products and services to segmented populations, and expanding the company’s influence via online channels. After creating strategic blueprints based on competitive analysis and profiling of targeted consumers, we identified key partners and vendors and addressed the operating model implications. As a result of our work, the client expects to yield more than 200,000 new affluent households and is investing $8 million in digital platforms.

Healthcare insurer improves customer experience

Healthcare insurer improves customer experience

As part of a broader cultural and organisational transformation strategy, a healthcare company wanted to improve its customer experience. Using human-centred design, Strategy& focused on two member journeys: post-enrollment 90 days and care in time of need. We set out initiatives to fix pain points, used human-centred design to reimagine the experience, and then mapped out key initiatives and capabilities required over waves of releases. As a result of our work, the client’s senior marketing executive said: “Reimagining a more personalised approach where employees step up and say ‘I’ve got it’ is key to re-energising our culture and brand.”

Pharmaceuticals company improves patient engagement

Pharmaceuticals company improves patient engagement

A top 5 pharmaceutical company wanted to improve patient engagement by designing, building, and launching a disease-agnostic patient engagement model that could be utilised across business units. Strategy& identified the key patient pain points, reviewed competitor programmes, and developed solution concepts. We then categorised the client’s patients into different personas and developed four solution concepts that serve as a curated, comprehensive engagement model for patients following diagnosis. This strengthened the client’s positioning in oncology, leveraged the client’s scale, and improved the scope of services provided to patients.

Leading oil and gas company redesigns its pricing structure

Leading oil and gas company redesigns its pricing structure

Having experienced an erosion of their value proposition to larger customers, an oil and gas giant sought to differentiate its offerings to large customers without leaking value to the smaller ones. We identified our client's one-size-fits-all approach to fuel pricing and card payments as the reason for value loss to large customers, and we designed pricing and card term structures which achieved our client's objectives with minimal risk. As a result, our client managed to shift its policy on pricing and card payments, ensuring retention of larger customers and an ability to be cost competitive for new large customer acquisitions.

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Peter  Gassmann

Peter Gassmann

Global Leader of Strategy&, Strategy&

Natalya  Lim

Natalya Lim

Partner, Eurasia Advisory Leader, Strategy&

Kağan Karamanoglu

Kağan Karamanoglu

Partner, Strategy&

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Edward C. Landry

Edward C. Landry

Principal, Strategy& US

Marc Hoogenberg

Marc Hoogenberg

Partner, Strategy& Netherlands

Akiko Karaki

Akiko Karaki

Partner, PwC Japan

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