Knowing you have a gap in the data and the experience is one thing. Doing something that improves the experience is another. Insight is very useful but it must lead to action.

Much of our effort should be in understanding where we are today, where we want to go, what the gaps are and what we can do move ahead. This is both short term with quick wins and the overall long term strategy.

Accurately identifying the gaps gets you on the road to improvement. This should be seen as a continuous process with huge incremental results. Lots of quick experiments and tests can tell you a lot about what works and what doesn’t.

Senior executives should help create a culture of gap analysis and continuous improvement. Without the focus and support of the digital executive, we can all fall into “analysis paralysis”.

Gap analysis and continuous improvement is something that can be done at all levels of the organization. The closer it is to the customer, the better. Customer champions, evangelist and advocates are best position to have great energy around this.

Basic training in facilitating the process doesn’t require huge budgets. Creating performance expectations for improving the experience in a tangible way is very important.

Here are the key ideas:

1. Start with simple approaches to encourage identifying gaps and plans to improve the experience.
2. Begin setting expectations that it is important to measure the results of the improvement initiatives.
3. Encourage a culture of continuous improvement.
4. Be sure to set clear goals for gains.
5. Clearly articulate why gap identification and improvement is important.
6. Identify evangelists and champions of continuous improvement.
7. Focus on staff closest to the customer. Listen to them first rather than a senior executive 5 levels removed.