70 days to Move from Challenge to Opportunity to Activation

Moving from Flexible to Agile

Part of our design ethos is not getting trapped in a single static viewpoint. We try to remain flexible, letting our customer-led research show us, and our clients, the truth behind their assumptions.

That flexible approach is what allows us to adapt when, during our mission to create a compelling wellness value proposition for our Property Client, the Coronavirus crisis changed everything.

As an owner of commercial buildings, they quickly recognised that the impact of COVID-19, and the social distancing measures that accompanied it, would have a considerable effect on their customers and their attitudes towards wellness in a commercial environment.

Partnering with us, they looked to define their customer’s core needs during a time of significant upheaval and how they could provide added value when attitudes towards working space were in constant flux.

City in a time of significant upheaval Property Client building scorecard

Turning Challenges Into Opportunities

Our first step in helping our Property Client reposition in such a way that they could continue to offer value to their customers was to absorb their perspective and understand the current experience from their perspective.

Stakeholder interviews and meetings with leading customer representatives helped us define the roadblocks to be overcome. We also conducted visits to their buildings that enabled us to immerse and gain insight into the experiences of the building community.

Connecting with customer needs

Connecting With the
Customer’s Needs

At a time when crisis on a global scale has left so many people raw and confronted, it was more important than ever to listen to their truths and let those verbatims be the primary driver of innovation.

Through researching global best practice, reviewing surveys and social media and conducting customer interviews, we were able to discover and understand customer feedback about specific business challenges.

Since we show you what simple data can’t, we created eight sets of needs states. Four pre-COVID and four post-COVID. These need states translated raw data into simple, but meaningful statements that would inform the activities that our Property Client produced and recommend.

The difference between the pre-COVID and post-COVID needs states allowed them to empathise with their customer’s struggles, both functionally and emotionally, during the crisis. This kind of deep understanding of customer needs is how we find the why that opens the how.

Covid 19 need states

Wellness in a Time of Crisis

Having identified the core needs of the customer, and how those needs were evolving in the face of crisis, we created and connected eight enablers to those need states that would keep the customer at the heart of operational decision-making process.

Because of the extremely fluid nature of how wellness is perceived during times of crisis, we also incepted a scorecard to evaluate their buildings regularly. This scorecard would allow them to stay connected to their customers, updating their value proposition in response to feedback and adapting to the new normal.

By embedding deep customer understanding into how they approached their value proposition, we provided the insight and clarity they needed to make confident innovations during a time of significant uncertainty.

These innovations allowed us to develop new and exciting ways to offer value that were outside the core deliverables of a building owner. These deliverables were then prioritised around their customer’s need states so they could continue to innovate into an uncertain future.

Customer jobs to be done by level of importance

Understand your Customers and Grow your business.

Let us help you identify the most important thing about your customers that will unlock your company’s growth.

TALK WITH A CX EXPERT

Delivering phenomenal outcomes


“Working with Proto was a leap of faith, but they have become a major strategic partner in our CX evolution. The work they've developed and the way we've been able to embed it in the organisation has been absolutely phenomenal, and we're getting the outcomes we want.”

Felicity Clark
Felicity Clark Customer Experience Manager

Creating empathy to deliver outstanding results


“Proto were a pleasure to work with. They were adaptive and responsive, and developed a deep empathy for both the client and their customers. The quality of their products and services was outstanding.”

Michael Storey
Michael Storey Manager of Customer Research and Strategy at Sydney Water

Halving your customer churn


“Without the customer experience insights from the research program, we would not have been able to identify the acquisition issues that we had. Changes to the customer interactions that led up to financial protection have reduced the outflow rates by 50%.”

Felicity Rowcliff Dean
Felicity Rowcliff Dean Customer Centred Design Manager

Take your NPS score to the next level


“From an NPS perspective, I have gone Spinal Tap on you guys and gone to 11. I still think the work you did with us, the way you went about it and the deliverables amounted to one of the best pieces of consulting advice I've ever commissioned.”

Matthew Liebmann
Matthew Liebmann Former Chief Operating Officer

Enabling customer-centric design


“Over the last 18 months, we've constantly referred to the work Proto did for us when designing and developing all the improvements to the app we're making. We've found their work to be highly valuable and has resulted in significant improvements to the MyOptus App that, without their insight wouldn't have been possible.”

Lucy Turner
Lucy Turner CX Design Launch Manager

Exceptional prototyping


“The outcome of the prototyping has been exceptional and we continue to use the knowledge and expertise that Proto shared with us during their engagement. The icing on the cake for me was that Proto captured all of the insights from the customer workshops into an organisational asset that we now use as an integral part of our toolkit for training and briefing new team members.”

Sharon Nanetti
Sharon Nanetti Optimal Care Program Director

Prioritising what matters


“Proto's in-depth customer research helped us to uncover underlying customer needs that wouldn't have been possible without an 'outside-in' approach. The team identified the core customer problems and provided actionable insights that enabled us to remove key areas of customer friction and frustration and redesign a credit card experience like no other.”

Christian Johansson
Christian Johansson Head of Marketing, Customer Finance

Achieving a 20 point increase in NPS


“I have worked with Damian and the team at Proto for several years. In this time, they have worked collaboratively with us to build a roadmap of strategic 'outside-in' initiatives that ultimately resulted in a 20 point increase in NPS. They imparted a great deal of CX knowledge, approaches and tools that have been invaluable to the team and the business.”

Amanda O'Donnell
Amanda O'Donnell Head of Customer Experience

Insight driven, customer centric ideas


“Proto revealed and captured a ton of insights, putting Gumtree in a position where we can take our experience from good to great!”

Coen Horrevoets
Coen Horrevoets Head of Product

Award-winning customer experiences


“We won the AFR Smart Investor SMILES award for Best Online Broker. This award is based on customer voting and I believe this was as a result of a clearer focus on our existing clients which you helped us to understand.”

Arni Selvarajah
Arnie Selvarajah Chief Executive Officer

Design that reduces cost to serve


“The Proto team demonstrated flexibility in their approach which made such a refreshing change. They took the time to coach and mentor each of us in a highly creative and energetic environment. Furthernore, they helped us exceed our customer satisfaction targets, all whilst stripping out in excess of 20% of our service costs in under 12 months. Proto helped us to stay focussed on the customer which enabled us to win in the market.”

Matthew Anderson
Matthew Anderson Chief Operating Officer

Service innovation at scale


“We worked with Proto on an exciting & unprecedented challenge at Optus, to design the customer experience of the future. Damian & the team had high energy & together we operated as 'one team'. Proto worked hand in hand with us to bring the internal team up to speed, & also brought in global experts to work with us to take our deliverables to another level of quality & innovation.”

Dan Sunderland
Dan Sunderland Director of Customer Experience Strategy and Planning

Actionable Customer Strategies


“Proto developed a membership strategy that addressed points of friction along our members journey, identified opportunities to improve and clarified the types of engagement that our members needed at the different stages in their career. We were impressed with the depth of insight that Proto were able to bring to the project - as well as the energy and ideas that they helped to generate.”

Sarah Thompson
Sarah Prescott-Thompson General Manager Shared Services

A partnership for CX


“Working with Proto was very much a partnership. We worked hand-in-hand to put CX on the map within the organisation. The team are flexible, trustworthy and do what it takes to achieve the best outcome. If you’re looking for a quality agency, providing quality data and insights – Proto are your guys. We received over 90 initiatives from the project of which 79% have now been implemented and we are seeing the benefits flow through!”

Customer Experience Specialist

Unique Product Innovation


“Proto integrated into multiple simultaneous projects to ensure we achieved the best outcome. They brought real clarity around customer needs, the fundamental elements of our value proposition and provided a clear roadmap of where we're trying to get to. This allowed us to differentiate beyond the traditional proposition. As a result, one customer-informed initiative we developed was loanScore™. This unique innovation helps customers see how good their home loan is and evaluate their options for a better deal.”

Anthony Justice
Anthony Jusitce CEO