The virtual era has arrived, and it’s in full swing. While the past couple of decades have largely been about making the digital transformation, 2020 has truly seen the biggest push toward this new age of digital operations and virtual communications. As part of this transformation into the remote age and digital society, companies have found that the customer experience is one of the most crucial aspects in growing and sustaining a business.

A number of similar-sounding terms are currently being bandied about in the tech industry. To make matters worse, what were once distinct dividing lines defining content-oriented technologies, these boundaries have now become fuzzy. Let’s pause a moment and take a look at the similarities and key differences. You’ll come to have a better understanding of the relationship between customer communication management (CCM) and the customer experience (CX).

Digital transformation requires more than simply integrating new digital technologies. True digital transformation translates to overhauling processes, re-architecting operations and reimagining products and services. But are companies truly considering the customer in their digital strategies?

Originally developed to help companies streamline, if not to altogether automate, transactional printing, CCM (customer communication management) has matured over the nearly 40 years since its inception. Today, the shift in automated communications continues from print to digital channels. This transition is no longer being driven by cost-saving initiatives cloaked in environmental stewardship, but rather by CX (customer experience) strategy and technology, data and analytics evaluation, and mobile device proliferation.

Many companies still rely on IT to make changes to their customer communications. It made sense when technology wasn’t advanced enough to provide non-technical users a way to interact with it, but today the “coders only” notion is as antiquated as flip phones and dial-up Internet connections.