CEOs are getting nervous. According to a quarterly survey of business leaders conducted by the Conference Board, 98% of US-based CEOs say they are preparing for an economic recession over the next 12 to 18 months. European leaders are even more fearful – 99% believe a recession is imminent. “CEOs are now preparing for near-inevitable recessions in both the US and Europe”, Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., Vice Chairman of the Business Council and Trustee of the Conference Board said.

Interest rates are rising, the housing market is slowing and according to the Consumer Price Index report released on 12 October, inflation is increasing at the fastest rate in 40 years in the US. Prices for everything excluding food and energy climbed 6.6% over the year up to the end of September. With the ongoing war in Ukraine and rising energy costs, the economic picture across the world is just a bleak.

Don’t panic. That’s generally good advice—but when business leaders are facing one of the worst economic downturns in more than a decade, it’s not particularly easy guidance to heed. With inflation hitting a 40-year high, companies like Amazon, FedEx, and Meta are in the unfamiliar position of tightening their belts. Yet crisis breeds opportunity.

Today’s shoppers insist on immediacy. They use their phones to get anything they want instantly. When it comes to shopping, a customer walks into a store and expects an item to be waiting for them on the shelf or immediately available through buy online, pickup in-store (BOPIS). What does this mean for retailers that want to stay ahead of consumer trends? Let’s take a closer look at what an endless aisle is and what it means for the retail world.

Even the highest-performing service organisations need to know where they stand among their competitors and how they can continue raising the bar to retain their status as leaders. You can find answers in the 2022 CX Accelerator report, where CX organisations are categorised according to our CX maturity model scale and rank as Starters, Emergers, Risers and CX Champions.

Delivering truly world-class customer experience is a challenge in this (and any) economic climate, where leaders must stay on top of service best practice and customer expectations to remain competitive. To find out how CX leaders do this, Zendesk surveyed nearly 5,000 customer service decision-makers around the world and compiled the results into our 2022 CX Accelerator report.

How mature is your CX organisation? As part of Zendesk’s survey of almost 5,000 customer service decision-makers around the world, we asked questions about the attitudes, behaviours and outcomes regarding their people, processes and data/technology. This led to our 2022 CX Accelerator report and maturity scale model, which allows you to assess where your business ranks.

CX organisations come in all shapes, sizes and configurations. And there are challenges and opportunities in every single one of them. Zendesk surveyed nearly 5,000 customer service decision-makers around the world to find how their organisation’s adoption of customer service and support best practice improves its ability to deliver superior customer experience (CX). The resulting 2022 CX Accelerator report uncovers fascinating insights about real-life pain points and clear calls to action.

Multilingual support is a must when serving an international customer base: 75 percent of consumers from 29 countries say they’re more likely to purchase from the same brand again if customer care is in their language. That’s not only important for CX in general, but especially so in times when companies are tightening their belts and focusing on customer retention over acquisition: After all, wowing your existing customer base is 5x cheaper than acquiring new customers.

Nothing sweeter than new Zendesk app integrations. Learn all about how these integrations can help out your sales and support teams.