Pizza Hut on how feedback can spark exciting innovation

Pizza Hut’s chief digital experience officer to reveal how customer insights can fast-track product development times to just six weeks

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By: Chanice Henry, Troy Barnes 03/09/2020

Image of Pizza Hut
Image source: Pizza Hut, LLC Press Room

In his keynote session at CX APAC, Troy Barnes, chief digital experience officer at Pizza Hut will be revealing how the F&B brand has injected life and accuracy into its innovation strategy through customer feedback data.

Pizza Hut’s customer insight analysis has triggered inspiration for new products and services that are tightly aligned to customer needs. This targeted approach has not only allowed the brand to innovate in meaningful ways, but it has fast-tracked research and development times. In his session, Barnes will be sharing how it is possible to develop a new product from research to delivery in just six weeks using customer insights.

Customer experience (CX) performance measurement 

Reflecting on his experience with multi-national companies, Barnes maintains that it is critical CX performance data is examined to surface improvement areas. Each customer interaction point should be assessed on:

  • Customer success – did the customer achieve their goals?
  • Customer effort – was it easy for them to interact with the brand?
  • Customer emotion – how does the customer feel about the interaction?

Barnes explains that these data points should be cross-referenced with NPS scores and a whole suite of operational measures around service time and quality. He adds: “When lower scores occur, ask follow up questions on how to improve service, and equally, with great scores, ask for feedback on where you are succeeding.”

It is vital that brands are responsive to customer satisfaction levels to ensure they bring value to their audience and address any points of concern. Barnes highlights that: “In today’s environment, proliferation can happen quickly due to social media. One negative complaint is no longer limited to the individual anymore. Very quickly it can be exposed to 10,000 people in that space, and we’ve already seen this happen to a number of companies across the world.”

Customer feedback and satisfaction projects

When reflecting on CX projects, Barnes flags that it is key to get the basics right around consistency, before brands get into what he calls “the real creative and fun stuff around innovation and digital. When you are in a large organization that services across multiple functions, teams and floors, the cohesiveness makes a huge difference in getting results.”

Barnes advocates a methodical approach and one size does not fit all, warning: “There will be new value areas that you will want to bring to your customers but it takes time get the foundations right before you begin walking or running.”

“A lot of what I learned along the journey would have been great to know upfront,” says Barnes. “It would have made the planning better orchestrated and probably a lot smoother.”