Lion approached The Customer Experience Company in 2019 with an ambitious goal: become the easiest beverage company to work with. But what makes Lion the ‘easiest’ for customers to do business with? We worked together to find that out.  

Lion's business customers were facing challenges. The beverage industry was changing, Covid-19 was wreaking havoc, and running an efficient brick-and-mortar business in the digital world has never been more complex. Lion needed to better serve and respond to feedback and expectations of their customers. So, Lion began exploring ways to create the best experience for their customers so they could meet the growing demands of their consumers. 

‍Voice of Customer revealed three areas of opportunity to improve customer experience

Using Voice of Customer data Lion identified three key opportunity areas:

• Create an easy to use self-service ordering experience
• Improve cash management for the customer, and
• Reduce admin for the customer.

Beginning with a vision to create a seamless digital experience for users, Lion and The Customer Experience Company kicked off two streams of work. Firstly, to define an industry-leading, mobile-first digital self-service experience for customers, and secondly, to streamline Lion’s back-end processes to support it.

‍

Achieving ‘Easiest to do Business with’ began with understanding customer and business needs

To pave the way to success, we began with understanding the customers' needs while also looking at Lion’s internal operations in order to increase business efficiency and customer satisfaction.

Equipped with this knowledge and understanding, we designed initiatives with customers' needs at the heart, enabling Lion to deliver desirable digital experiences efficiently and effectively.

‍

‍Twelve customer-focussed and digitally-enabled initiatives empower Lion to champion the customer

The initiatives and concepts were tested with customers and employees and supported with in-depth financial analysis. Collaboratively with Lion, we prioritised the initiatives to a ‘Top 12’ that would deliver the highest impact for customer satisfaction and have the most significant impact on the business.

"CEC coming to us with the initiatives was really exciting. It’s really great to get involved and talk through designs and make decisions based on that."
- Deanie Smock, Lion Digital Program Lead

The initiatives to increase customer satisfaction included up-to-date, real-time information, with a personalised dashboard and customisable communication preferences. They leverage predictive analytics and customer data to anticipate customer trends ahead of time and deliver on customer demand.

The initiatives also applied technical innovations to Lion's internal operations that would be low-effort to implement but make a huge difference to customer experience. For example, making it easier for customers to request credits and get refunded faster, resulting in  customers spending less time on admin, and more time on their business (and not to mention more time on the golf course!)

"I am really enjoying using the new Lion App. I like being able to quickly (and very easily) order stock, check past invoices, and check on product details. I even managed to order some stock while playing a game of golf!"
- Sharon Wiggins, Liquorland Taupo.

‍

We supported the initiatives with designs of the digital ordering experience, reimagining how to best deliver these in a way that was easy for customers to adopt.

Of the 12 initiatives delivered to Lion, five had been implemented at the time of the launch of the digital marketplace, with more in pilot and development. With growing adoption and continuous positive customer feedback, the marketplace launch was ultimately a success.

“Listening to our customers throughout the design process was fundamental in creating a product that was tailored to their needs.”
- John Hayles, Lion Design Lead | Digital Customer & Consumer Experience

‍

Lion forge forward toward success

Armed with both a website and an app that's customer-centric and easy to use, backed by a strong vision and clear priorities, this is just the beginning of Lion’s Marketplace journey. 

The number of (happy) customers using the Marketplace grows each and every day and Lion continues to listen to customer feedback to improve and deliver a best in class customer experience. 

In 2022, it received a prestigious Good Design Award Winner Accolade in the Service Design category in recognition for outstanding design and innovation.

“Customer focused digital projects often become distracted by digital and lose sight of the customer need. Encouraging identification of honesty, and focus on alleviating pain, points as the primary goal.”
– The Good Design Awards Jury