10 Best Customer Experience Training Courses

Not long ago the international courier brand, FedEx, had an internal communication issue that was damaging their customer experience and costing them millions.

They’d been sending 13 different emails per month to each of their B2B accounts and often they weren’t even relevant. But then, a new content manager came along and rebuilt their newsletter system, streamlining its output and making sure everything was targeted to customer needs.

The result? A double-digit revenue increase and more engaged customers.

Take another example: Nationwide, the UK bank. Thanks to its dedicated CX department, the Office for Customer Advocacy, Nationwide continually gauges customer loyalty and finds areas to improve while closing the loop with every customer survey.

Now, Nationwide has increased sales by 7.5% in two years and has become the #1 small business insurer.

What do these stories have in common? A dedication to customer experience (CX).

But that dedication didn’t just come out of nowhere. It was learned and implemented well for the best results.

The good news is that you can learn it, too. With customer experience training and courses, your front-line staff, middle management, and executives can gain the in-depth understanding your business needs to enhance the customer journey.

Just as FedEx and Nationwide learned how, with these courses you’ll learn the techniques to grow your revenue through CX improvement.

Because when CX is improved the right way, you’ll increase your customer lifetime value and cut the costs of customer acquisition.

Read on to discover 10 of the best customer experience training courses out there.

What to Look For in Customer Experience Training

Before we share our favorite customer experience courses, let’s consider what you should look for in any training program.

We believe there are three key elements CX training should involve to make it worth your time:

• A CX philosophy you can believe in. Not every business expert or consultancy thinks about CX in the same way. While, for many, customer experience is just about distributing customer surveys and patting themselves on the back, others take a more rigorous approach.

At CustomerGauge, we’re pioneers in tying customer experience to revenue. In all our courses, we teach Account Experience (AX), our methodology for using CX to drive growth.

• A coach with the right expertise. A quality course in any topic requires a quality trainer. Just like you should with your customers, a CX coach should inspire trust, have the right knowledge, and boast extensive hands-on experience in the field.

Cary T. Self is our Global VP of Education at CustomerGauge. Having been a CustomerGauge customer himself, he has the real experience of improving CX, and driving business growth, as both a learner and an educator.

• Customer experience certification. After completing a course with the CustomerGauge Academy, you’ll have the proof of your skills in the field. We offer accreditation for every level of a business, from frontline staff to CEOs.

Let’s take a look at 10 of our CX courses that offer all three.

Top 10 Customer Experience Courses for B2B Brands

1. CustomerGauge Academy Subscription

First up, the CustomerGauge Academy Subscription.

This gives learners access to the full range of CustomerGauge’s CX courses, from short targeted courses (on specific techniques such as survey methodologies) to longer customer experience workshops that delve into the intricacies of Net Promoter Score (NPS) and customer retention.

As in all the courses we share below, this platinum subscription includes case studies from top global brands, access to the weekly B2B podcast, and an extensive library of industry-leading CX eBooks with reach to future publications and reports.

Of course, all customer experience strategy and design courses that result in AX certification and CX certifications are also included with this subscription. It’s a perfect package both for those starting out in their career in CX and for experienced managers who want to stay ahead of the CX curve in the B2B sector.

An Academy Subscription includes:

• Access to all 9 Customer Experience Training Courses noted below

• An extensive library of industry-leading reports and eBooks

• Weekly B2B podcasts

2. Account Experience B2B CX Certification — Platinum & Gold Courses

For the complete education in customer experience for B2B, start with the Account Experience (B2B CX) Certification course.

Offering an in-depth guide to our Account Experience methodology, the certification leads you through six individual courses that cover crucial aspects of managing B2B accounts.

Start by understanding customer loyalty or learn how to optimize CX for each stakeholder within your accounts. Across the program , learners will gain a firm understanding of each aspect of AX and how customer sentiment relates to revenue.

The comprehensive AX Certification course is ideal for anyone starting out in B2B CX or wishing to enhance their understanding and capabilities in this area. Managers tasked with implementing B2B CX programs will also find this course delivers the extensive understanding needed to make such programs a success.

Course-specific content totals approximately 7 hours. Meanwhile, an additional 15 hours of supplemental content such as reports, case studies, and supporting articles gives learners all they need to become proficient in B2B CX management.

Each of the smaller courses needs to be successfully completed before a final exam can be taken and certification awarded.

Account Experience (B2B CX) Certification course covers:

• Achieving Customer Loyalty

• Understanding Your AX (B2B CX) Program

• Listening to Feedback

• Analyzing Results

• Closing the Loop

• Optimizing your AX (B2B CX) Program

Although no prior experience or knowledge is required to achieve success in this digital customer experience course, reading Fred Reicheld’s book, The Ultimate Question 2.0 - How Net Promoter Companies Thrive in a Customer-Driven World is beneficial prior to commence training.

3. Net Promoter Score — Platinum Course

Looking for a specific place to start with customer experience? Try Net Promoter Score (NPS).

Why? NPS is the most trusted metric for understanding B2B experience. Using simple surveys to gain insight into customer feelings about your brand, it reveals insights into where you can improve.

And it has a substantial impact on growth: B2B companies that survey their customers every quarter see a 5.2% increase in retention.

CustomerGauge’s Net Promoter course starts with the foundational knowledge needed to understand NPS. You’ll cover what NPS actually is, why it matters for developing your CX program, and what you need to do to get started. At the end of the course, learners will have the skills required for using these indicators to drive loyalty and improve revenue.

Anyone at any B2B company wishing to compete through CX improvement, from frontline operatives to C-Suite executives, will benefit from this foundational course.

Learners can confidently start with zero knowledge of customer engagement metrics and finish with a complete understanding of how they can use it to be successful with their own customer experience management strategy (CXM).

NPS Course modules cover:

• The origins of NPS

• Asking your customers the right questions

• Calculating your Net Promoter Score

• The traits and hallmarks of Promoters, Passives, and Detractors

• The importance of closing the loop with customers and how to do it

4. Achieving Customer Loyalty — Gold and Platinum Courses

Loyal customers spend more, bring new business, and give firms the insights needed for growth.

Understanding how to build customer loyalty and why it is important improves the effectiveness of account and customer experience managers.

Loyal customers are simply worth more, so why not learn how to improve your customer loyalty? That’s what our Achieving Customer Loyalty course is all about.

The course provides the foundational knowledge of customer loyalty, along with proven tactics to reduce churn and elicit emotional attachments between your customers and you. As a result, it’s the perfect choice for managers that want to build their customer lifetime value and drive profits.

“At the end of the day, we're trying to create loyalty to generate revenue and income. We believe in that. We think it's the right thing to do. That’s why it's the first thing we teach you out of the gate in the Academy—to tie loyalty to customer lifetime value." Cary T. Self.

Achieving Customer Loyalty modules cover:

• What customer loyalty and lifetime value are

• How to measure and improve lifetime value

• The three elements of referral value and how to capture it

• Building customer loyalty

• Loyalty leaders and the NPS framework

• “Excellent content.” - 5-stars from TC

• “Loved how you structured the course, with knowledge and real-life stories, and some blog posts and PDF. It keeps it fresh and new rather than repetitive.” - 5-stars from ER

5. Understanding Your AX (B2B CX) Program — Platinum & Gold Course

If you haven’t subscribed to the whole Account Experience certification (and even if you have), you’ll need a course to help you get your AX program up and running.

Our Understanding Your AX (B2B CX) Program course guides you through the necessary steps of creating a Net Promoter System program from scratch. Program champions and CX professionals alike will benefit from in-depth knowledge of the key elements of Account Experience — from closing the loop to monetizing your CX results.

The course content takes approximately 1 hour to complete and 3 hours of supplementary learning materials are also included. Course materials include short quizzes, informative articles, and a definitive guide to B2B CX.

Understanding Your AX (B2B CX) Program course modules cover:

• Net Promoter Programs:what they are, why they matter, and how to build a successful Net Promoter System

• Why gaining organizational buy-in is imperative to the success of B2B CX programs

• Customer journey mapping: definitions and how they inform NPS programs

• “Such a wealth of knowledge in this lesson. I really enjoyed the first-hand experience related in the Monetize snippets.” 5-stars from MK

• “Really enjoyed the presentation on ‘Staying married to your customers’” 5-stars from TC

6. Optimizing Your AX Program (B2B CX) — Platinum Course

It’s one thing to start an Account Experience program, it’s quite another to ensure that it’s working for your business growth.

To improve any NPS program, you’ll need deeper skills and an ability to see how to improve for yourself. Our Optimizing Your AX Program course provides exactly that.

For example, participants will learn about the value and use of competitor benchmarks and how they can be used to influence and enhance your own NPS program. You’ll learn how to set your own goals for growth, too.

Further, the importance of company culture is also included in the 1-hour course. It’s crucial because your teams will greatly influence the success of your NPS program or CX endeavor.

“No matter how great your solution or program, if you don't have the buy-in from your organization, it's going to fail. It takes only a couple of saboteurs to kind of offset a program—if they don't believe in it or understand it. So I'm a big believer that any program or program owner should really make sure that they are meeting with these different department groups. I think it's the first step.” — Cary T. Self

This course sits within the comprehensive Account Experience (B2B CX) Certification course but can also be taken as a stand-alone module. We advise that you complete short courses on Achieving Customer Loyalty, Understanding Your AX, and Closing the Loop before attempting this short course.

Optimizing Your AX Program (B2B CX) modules cover:

• Competitor benchmarking analysis

• Optimizing AX with consideration of culture

• Optimizing to Targets

• “Terrific content!” 5-stars from RC

7. Listening to Feedback — Platinum Course

Listening is one of the most underrated business skills, particularly when it comes to improving customer relationships. Learning how to listen, what to listen to, and actively showing customers they’ve been heard are essential lessons for driving customer satisfaction.

It’s said that good communication is at least 45% listening. Little gestures such as follow-up emails and thank yous for completing surveys show customers they’re being heard. They’re small things that over 75% of NPS frontrunners do to show customers they’re listening.

In our course, Listening to Feedback, you’ll learn just how much it matters. Participants of this course learn the different values gained from relational and transactional survey data and how this data on customers’ overall experience. This also includes their experience of specific touchpoints are both highly valuable forms of feedback that inform different CX actions.

The course ends with lessons on how to mitigate gaming customer listening mechanisms. Surveys can be used in ways that false positives are given. Sending them to customers you know are happy with your service, or providing incorrect sample data are two common ways CX surveying processes can be gamed.

Listening to Feedback modules cover:

• Listening to customers

• Relational surveys

• Transactional surveys

• Optimizing survey response rates

• Gaming the system

• “As someone who has never implemented a survey strategy, this is very helpful in understanding best practices. I can also relate to a few of the gaming tactics, as I've experienced a few in the wild.” 5-stars from TC

• “Someone said that the [CustomerGauge] Academy was like someone handing you a puzzle and every new section is auto-completing this AX puzzle. I wouldn't have believed them until I saw it with my own eyes. Very smooth and transparent section.” 5-stars from PG

8. Analyzing Results — Platinum Course

You’ve listened, but if you don’t understand what your customers are telling you, how can you ever hope to improve their experience and your Net Promoter Score? Our platinum course on Analyzing Results shares the fundamentals of customer experience analytics and how to interpret your survey results.

But it doesn’t stop there. Learners will also grasp the drivers of detractors and promotors and the root causes they must solve to push the needle of growth in the right direction. For example, learners will explore the different types of customer sentiment drivers and how they can learn from each.

It is helpful to complete the Listening to Feedback course modules before attempting this customer experience analytics course. This course also sits within the wider Account Experience (B2B CX) program where full customer experience certification can be gained.

Analyzing Results modules cover:

• Analytical approaches

• Descriptive Vs Inferential statistics

• Stated, Descriptive and Inferential Driver analysis

• Statistical significance of different drivers

• “Thorough. Simple. Relevant at multiple levels of responsibility.” 5-stars from R.N

• “The examples were helpful. The "theory" was tough to get through at times.” 4-stars from R.C

9. Closing the Loop — Platinum Course

There are many different ways to close the loop on customer feedback. Our Closing the Loop course will teach you best practices while providing real-world examples of why responding to all customer feedback is important — particularly if it’s not so complimentary.

Designed for all Account Experience and Customer Experience professionals, or NPS program champions wishing to push their careers and companies forward, the digital customer experience course, Closing the Loop, teaches participants how to manage some of the most difficult aspects of customer experience management.

Completing the Listening to Feedback and Analyzing Results courses before attempting this customer experience training will enable learners to get the most from the modules.

Closing the Loop modules cover:

• Proven steps for closing the loop at different organizational levels

• Good processes for closing the loop

• Closing the loop at the front line and at the management level

• Manager’s level tasks and Executive level tasks

• “Understanding that closing the loop is a cross-organization task is very important. Closing the loop doesn't start or end with the front-line workers but involves every level of the business.” 5-stars from P.G

• “Excellent. Relevant. Concise.” 5-stars from R.N

10. Customer Journey Map — Platinum Course

Remember FedEx? They used customer journey mapping to identify where they were getting their communication with customers wrong. And when they remedied that situation, they saw big savings and a big boost in revenue, too.

If you want to grow your revenue, you’ll need to do this.Our Customer Journey Mapping course lets you get to grips with each of the touchpoints your customers go through to do business with your organization.

Maybe you’ll also be amazed to learn how each of your company's departments influences customers’ perspectives on the value you provide. When you have a full understanding of your customer journey, you’ll know how to enhance it, the right way.

This course can be taken as a stand-alone course to understand what customer journey mapping is and to carry it out or as part of the broader Account Experience Certification program.

It takes an estimated 3 hours to digest all of the course content.

Customer Journey Mapping modules cover:

• What customer journey mapping is and why it’s important

• Mastering omnichannel experiences

• Aligning surveys with your customer journey

• How to create and use a customer journey map