Customer engagement is the foundation of a successful service organization. Whether you’re trying to acquire new customers, convert your prospective audience, or retain the customers you already have, your interactions play a crucial role.
“Even if you aren’t in a traditional customer service organization, I would argue that all organizations are service organizations,” says Harvard Business School Professor Ryan Buell, who teaches the online course Transforming Customer Experiences.
Buell defines service as “the business of people helping people,” explaining that exceptional customer service is measured by how well you satisfy consumers’ needs, preferences, and expectations.
One of the most effective ways to foster customer loyalty and long-term client retention is by focusing on customer engagement.
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Customer engagement refers to the interactions and relationships a company builds with its clients over time.
“Now, if every customer who walked through the door had the same needs, preferences, and expectations and engaged with the business in exactly the same way, delivering service would be easy,” Buell says in Transforming Customer Experiences. “But of course, every customer is different, which is what makes delivering service challenging.”
While engagement strategies vary, the most effective ones focus on designing a compelling customer journey and prioritize building trust.
Customer Acquisition & Engagement Strategy
Creating an effective engagement strategy starts with customer acquisition. After all, you can’t engage consumers you don’t have. Customer acquisition refers to the process of attracting and acquiring new clients.
Businesses acquire customers through digital marketing strategies, such as search engine optimization (SEO), social media and influencer marketing, and paid advertising.
Customer acquisition strategies vary based on the product or business model. For instance, a consumer product or service may lean heavily on influencer marketing and paid advertising, while a local business may benefit greatly from SEO optimization, ensuring they’re easily found in search engine results when people nearby look for their services.
The customer journey—the path from initial awareness to brand loyalty—depends on trust.
Related: How to Create a Digital Marketing Plan: 4 Steps
Increasing Customer Engagement by Building Trust
So, how do you build trust? Harvard Business School Professor Frances Frei and Anne Morriss, co-founders of The Leadership Consortium, break it down with the trust triangle—inspired by Aristotle’s rhetorical triangle, which highlights ethos, pathos, and logos as the keys to persuasive speech.
Frei and Morriss’s trust triangle builds on this, emphasizing authenticity (ethos), empathy (pathos), and logic (logos) as the foundation for customer trust. Here’s the role each plays:
- Authenticity (Ethos): Authenticity shows customers you’re genuinely invested in their success, making them more comfortable to take the next step.
- Logic (Logos): Clear, sound reasoning helps establish you as a reliable resource.
- Empathy (Pathos): Customers are likelier to engage when they feel heard and valued.
“Designing trust—using authenticity, logic, and empathy—into the customer journey process requires intentionality,” Buell says in Transforming Customer Experiences. “Organizations need to think about how employees should interact with customers at every phase and systematically encourage that behavior.”
A Customer Engagement Journey: Examples
1. Authenticity: Introductory Call
Harvard Business School alum Zameer Kassam is the founder, CEO, and chief designer of Kassam Fine Jewelry. He integrates the trust triangle into every stage of his customer journey, beginning with authenticity as the foundation.
Kassam, who specializes in custom engagement rings inspired by his clients’ love stories, understands that trust is essential for a personal and high-value purchase. To build it, Kassam and his team of storytellers developed a bespoke customer journey founded upon the trust triangle’s principles.
An introductory call is a crucial first step for two reasons:
- It allows potential customers to determine whether your services align with their needs
- It helps you determine if their expectations match your business objectives
This conversation helps establish alignment on key details such as pricing, timelines, and overall expectations.
For Kassam, these calls also provide a unique opportunity to demonstrate his business’s authenticity and explain how his team translates love stories into personalized designs.
“Our team has been well-trained,” Kassam says in Transforming Customer Experiences. “Some of the storytellers have been with us for five, 10 years, and that translates to tens of thousands of such calls.”
An introductory call is an opportunity to deepen their client relationship and give them the space to open up. Kassam and his team focus on understanding each customer's goals and story, using the 30-minute conversation to determine compatibility. These calls help assess whether clients are open to sharing their stories and connecting.
2. Logic: Educate the Customer
Whole Foods excels at positioning itself as a trusted expert in healthy eating. The supermarket chain has built website content and in-store messaging to inform customers invested in purchasing nutritious food.
Their website’s “Tips, Ideas and Recipes” section educates customers on different types of foods, their seasonality, and ways to engage with the food system, like composting. They also provide recipes to teach users how best to cook with different ingredients.
The in-store messaging reinforces their commitment to quality offerings, building trust in the Whole Foods brand. Visuals in the store include information about sustainable seafood, their environmental commitment, and organic and natural foods’ benefits.
Whole Foods introduces customers to new brands and ingredients by offering samples—turning education into an engaging, hands-on experience.
3. Empathy: Listen and Respond
Online home rental marketplace Airbnb exemplifies a service organization that actively listens to and anticipates customer needs—an essential quality in the hospitality industry. Airbnb’s search experience is tailored to accommodate various guest needs, from diverse lodging options to Wi-Fi availability and accessibility features.
Empathetic customer support is crucial to addressing guests’ needs and concerns, and Airbnb excels by providing responsive communication across multiple channels, including email, phone, SMS text, and social media.
Airbnb actively incorporates guest feedback, soliciting input after each stay and using it to improve the platform. For instance, when guests expressed frustrations with a complicated booking process, Airbnb introduced a one-click booking option to streamline the experience.
Airbnb also prioritizes its hosts’ needs by offering AirCover protection from liabilities, educational hosting videos, and a dedicated Community Center for peer support and connection.
Developing Your Customer Engagement Strategy
As these examples show, building customer trust is key to driving deeper engagement. While each service organization’s journey is unique, the trust triangle can inform a variety of businesses.
“There’s a tendency in service to not engage customers in the process, especially in luxury offerings,” Buell says in Transforming Customer Experiences. “And yet, by giving customers a role in the process, they become more invested in what we’re creating together.”
By applying the trust triangle, businesses can strengthen customer retention and build lasting brand loyalty.
To explore additional strategies for improving and measuring customer engagement, consider taking an online course like Transforming Customer Experiences. Featuring insights from successful business leaders like Zameer Kassam, the course combines real-world cases with interactive exercises to reinforce key concepts.
Ready to transform your customer experience and build lasting loyalty? Explore Transforming Customer Experiences—one of our online entrepreneurship and innovation courses—and download our online learning success guide to learn more about how an online program can benefit your career.
