A few years ago, I wrote an article about the phenomenon of Customer Delight in customer experience. At the time, I strongly criticized the fact that most companies would be better off focusing on improving their basic customer experience, instead of reinventing the wheel every time with WOW moments.
Today, however, I notice a different phenomenon. Instead of focusing on WOW moments, the pendulum has swung completely over the top, and it seems as if "good enough" is the new norm within customer service.
So, it is time for a substantial blog post and an ode to the idea behind customer excellence.
The basics: the difference between customer experience & customer excellence
Before we move on to my vision on customer experience and finding a healthy balance between perfectionism and "good enough," I would like to share some relevant terms and terminology:
Customer experience
Customer experience, or “customer perception,” is to me every perception and emotion a customer experiences during all (direct & indirect) interactions with your company, throughout the entire customer journey and across all channels. That experience can be good, mediocre, bad, and just about everything in between. So, it is actually a neutral term.
Customer delight
There are many different interpretations of delighting customers. Some speak of frequently creating WOW moments, others of exceeding expectations to such an extent that you don't just get satisfied customers, but enthusiastic ambassadors / fans / believers... For me personally, it is a combination of both, with an explicit emphasis on regularly making customers WOW.
The downside of pursuing "delight" can be that you no longer always focus clearly on what the customer expects from you, with the result that your customer experience strategy becomes a sort of over-the-top bells-and- whistles factory.
Customer excellence
For me, excelling in customer experience is about the conscious choice to consistently service and treat customers better than strictly necessary . Mind you, for me this is not about always doing everything 100% perfectly, because that does not exist. But it is about striving for that always perfect service.
It means looking beyond your internal processes and systems. It means training your employees and giving them the space to think and act with a satisfied customer in mind during every customer interaction. And above all, it means not losing touch with what it feels like to be your customer.
Excellence is not found in one WOW moment, but in 100 small details and choices you make every single day.
The result for the customer? Customer service that makes the difference between feeling "just" helped or
“They really went the extra mile for me here.” And it is precisely that feeling that makes the difference between an okay experience and a customer who spontaneously recommends you.
What "good enough" customer experience looks like in real life
Example 1: a luxury resort
Imagine this: you book a stay and read the following on the website: a small-scale premium resort where luxury and nature go hand in hand with stylish waterfront cottages. You start dreaming of your week or weekend away. Upon arrival at your cottage, everything looks stunning at first glance. Until you light the fireplace and are treated to the following image.
![Center Parcs customer experience]()
The CXer in me can't resist testing whether it's the inside or the outside of the fireplace. ![]()
Great was my surprise when I was able to wipe away the dust with an ordinary dry cloth. A little later, in the bathroom, the same story. Everything clean, until I used the hand soap for the first time and noticed that the bottle was covered in dust.
Is this a disaster? No. But it is a clear case of being content too quickly, if you ask me, or of a lack of a control process. And that does not fit the brand promise of premium and luxury by the water.
Disclaimer: I have been to the same resort multiple times in the meantime, and every time it was the same story. That is a shame, because they also do many things well, as you can hear in our podcast episode .
Example 2: Looking for new windows
We requested a quote from a company to replace our windows and doors. Someone came by, we gave him a full explanation of the new and old situation, and afterwards I sent him the plans for the new layout. When reviewing our quote afterwards, it turned out that several windows had not been included. The response: they were no longer on the plans. Granted, an error had indeed crept into the plans, but from a party that talks about taking the burden off your shoulders, I surely expect that if there are suddenly 4 rooms without windows, you would just call the client to check if this is correct...
Now, as a customer, you have to wait again, and as a company, you have to go through the file all over again. Many lost hours that could be resolved by offering just that little bit of extra customer excellence.
Three consequences of being satisfied with "just good"
1. No one gets really excited about a meh experience
Have you ever heard anyone tell a warm, enthusiastic story about a customer experience that was just okay? Exactly.
Ordinary things like being friendly, polite, on time, and clean... are the norm. I am sorry, but the harsh reality is that you don't get applause if you do these things well. However, you will receive negative publicity if you don't do them well (anymore). Our service expectations as consumers and customers are simply high, and you can have all sorts of opinions about that, but as a company, you simply have to act accordingly.
2. You go from good-enough to 'bad' (too) quickly
Suppose you promise your customers to answer questions within one working day. Due to workload, you don't always manage to do so, and gradually the standard shifts to two working days. Without adjustment, how long do you think it will take before within a week is also acceptable? When you let go of the focus on your customer service and customer experience, it almost automatically means that it won't be long before you receive a heavily watered-down version of what you once considered your core quality.
Is that a problem? If it is a conscious choice, not necessarily. Usually, however, this is a process running beneath the surface. The result: it is only noticed when customers start complaining, and by then it is already too late.
3. Always playing it safe creates mediocrity
I hear it often: we aren't going to promise too many concrete things to clients because "they'll hold us accountable if something goes wrong." First of all, I have yet to meet the first client lurking around the corner like a sniper to catch you making a mistake ;-). If things go wrong (and they will go wrong; doing everything right 100% of the time is an illusion), it's about how you handle it at that moment. No more, but no less.
Furthermore, by not setting yourself exciting, ambitious customer experience goals, you automatically cultivate a sort of "mediocrity is good enough" feeling. And meanwhile, just emailing customers for that 5-star review from your marketing department... ;-)
![customer service City of Mechelen]()
Yes, but isn't perfectionism unhealthy either?
That's right. And I'm not claiming in this blog that it's a disaster if something goes wrong in your customer experience. But I am saying that you need to give it the necessary attention, constantly monitor it, and strive for adjustments. I was once in a board meeting where they were discussing figures from the telephone system. Over the past three quarters, they had a missed call rate of 40%. In plain language: that is almost half of the incoming calls (read: customer inquiries) that were not answered.
When I pointed out, admittedly rather sharply, that this surely wasn't normal, the response was: "Well, it has just been like this for a long time." At that moment, you really lost sight of me: that behind those figures, those statistics, those KPIs are people who have paid money for a service you promised.
So, does everything have to be perfect? No. But you must strive to at least do what you promised your client. And we all tend to throw around words like "unburdening," "total approach," "worry-free" quite quickly... So strive every day to live up to that 100%.
Or as I said this week: may 2026 be the year in which excellence is celebrated again and mediocrity receives no more applause.
After all, mediocrity isn't something to be proud of when it comes to quality and customer experience, right?
How excellent is your customer experience really?
At Customerry, we take a close look at your customer service. We analyze your current customer experience, map out customer frustrations and blind spots in your customer journey, help you make better customer-centric choices, and teach you and your teams how to communicate in a customer-centric way.
The outcome of such an exercise: less frustration, less wasted time, and not infrequently more revenue and more word-of-mouth advertising.
Great was my surprise when I was able to wipe away the dust with an ordinary dry cloth. A little later, in the bathroom, the same story. Everything clean, until I used the hand soap for the first time and noticed that the bottle was covered in dust.
