Rick Denton: 0:05

You're listening to CX Passport, the show about creating great customer experiences with a dash of travel talk. Each episode we’ll talk with our guests about great CX, travel...and just like the best journeys, explore new directions we never anticipated. I'm your host Rick Denton. I believe the best meals are served outside and require a passport. Let's get going. My intent for CX passport is to learn from customer experience voices around the world. As I've gotten the podcast going, I've been a little to Europe and US heavy. That's why I'm so excited to talk with Laise Pôrto joining us today from Brazil. Laise and I originally met each other on Jonathan Daniels brilliant webinar series, CX centric conversation, hit pause, have a look at the link in the show notes and go register for his next session. His purposely designed global approach to the discussion is like none other, then come on back to the CX passport episode. I really appreciated the perspective that he's provided to customer experience. There's much that's the same across the globe. But so often, we fail to really appreciate the geographic and cultural differences that can exist in customer experience. While the US does a great job of bringing that region's perspective to life. Let's also realize that Brazil is an amazing country with wonderful people, wonderful food and wonderful destinations. It shouldn't be a surprise to you that I want to talk to ladies about all of that as well. Laise, welcome to CX passport.

Laise Pôrto: 1:40

Hello, folks. It's such an honor and a privilege to be invited to participate in this podcast. I'm very happy to be here today. I wish to thank you Rick for these very kind invitation.

Rick Denton: 1:54

I am. I'm just excited that you're willing to accept that invitation. So it looks like we've got a nice good mutual hey, let's get started kind of vibe here. I love it. And let's just start right at the beginning. How did you like us get started in a customer experience career in Brazil.

Laise Pôrto: 2:09

So to understand how I started my career is because my experience professional needs to tell you everything. So starting from the beginning, on your marketing communications professional with over 15 years of experience in different industries, like technology, entertainment, logistic, a mining, chemical, and etc. I have spent these last few years developing my skills in which I have a degree out my love for manage teams and so the person has problems focusing on their experiences. Nowadays, I work as a customer experience coordinator at either BSD Brazil and integrated logistic solutions company where I lead the CX team. So five years ago, I started my career as a customer experience professional with the challenges of overseeing the organization restructuring into our customer focused company. In addition, I starting based in deepening in curses, Sterling hearts, and most importantly, putting everything into practice, guiding the tire company towards a new mindset and deploying a customer centric culture were some attitudes to the positive results achieved. In 2019, I was recognized as the best customer experience professional in Brazil, at the CX summit to award that well, yeah, one of the largest customer experience events in Latin America, I have to say that I I'm very proud of being our audience. So since then, I love doing what I'm doing now is a customer experience professional. And that's pretty much who I am in a nutshell. Oh,

Rick Denton: 4:03

my goodness, what a depth I even though you and I have talked before. I didn't know all of that. And certainly Congratulations on the win in 2019. That is, that is an impressive win to think to top of an entire country. And this is, you know, I hope that people know Brazil that Brazil is not this little tiny country, Brazil is a really big, significant, important country. And I'm thinking about that with that depth of experience that you have in customer experience. And given the amount of time that you're describing there, you've got to have seen changes. So how have you seen CX change in Latin America and Brazil in particular over that time?

Laise Pôrto: 4:41

Yeah. It overheard that Brazilians are one of the most engaged people in the world. It's because we've validated the experience above many other factors. And this is directly reflected in these way we can sum the fact is that most Brazilians and I am talking about more than 70%, change their brand after only one bad experience. That means that in order to retain the Brazilian customer, companies had to develop a greater maturity with regard to relationship and conversations they maintain with customers. Consider this Brazil follows a trend that has been growing throughout Latin America. With the digitalization process with accelerated struggle during the pandemic, the region stalled out to globally in developing the development of new projects, channels internal process aimed at good digital experience, for example, we can see a lot of reserves. And the last one that I've seen was from Zendesk highlighting the customer experience best practices such as availability of multiple service channels that's working area and integrated way to for the customers was the real time data and qualification of support teams, these sets of factors showed LatinAmerica companies that leads in CX are 4.4 time, times more likely to delight their customers. And the impact of these on the business was evident. As these companies are 2.3 times more likely to gain market share, hands down LatinAmerica can become a global benchmark in customer experience, of course, there is still a long way to go to delight all types and generations of consumers. But the good news is that these these and ensure that is increasingly present in companies right now.

Your CX Passport Captain: 10:00

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Rick Denton: 10:26

That is something that so I've had the opportunity to work and I say work I was only in Brazil for six weeks. And it's a sad statement that it was only six weeks. But what a delightful six weeks it was in 1998. Yeah, 1998. So it's been a long time. But it was in Sao Paulo. And what you described is something that I noticed even back then before I even really I was a junior in my career didn't even really think about customer experience. But as a customer, I saw that value for experience, whether it was on a beach, whether it was at an upscale restaurant, or even when you talk about the people it brought to mind, there was a neighborhood sushi restaurant that I would go to probably not kidding, maybe three or four times a week. And listeners, the sushi culture is strong in Brazil, if you want great sushi, trust me, Brazil is a great place for it. But it was exactly that within a few visits, they knew who I was, they knew that I was clearly not from Brazil, they were tolerant of my incredibly bad Portuguese, they were willing to greet me at the door and it made it where Yeah, I went back three or four times a week just because they made me feel so special on that human level. And that was something that I really noticed in the Brazilian culture. That's awfully true. Let's talk about that a little bit, though, because you've said a phrase and I think you've kind of mentioned it already. But I'd like you to expand on this. You have said that CX marketing works in Brazil. Tell me what you mean by that.

Laise Pôrto: 11:57

First of all, that's totally true. We love sushi here in Brazil, like something that anyone in the world can notice about the Brazilian people is that even if, with our challenges here, we like to live it deeply. So no doubt each experience, we become more demanding in our decision making. And I can say that is in our a sense to explore more and more the way we live. Our perceptions allow us to go beyond the basics, and leave experience to memories. And then reality is that the way customers discover and interact with brands has evolved. And the marketing strategy must reflect these changes. For example, Brazilians today are represented by increasingly connected consumer consumers, who are looking for more options, greater convenience, better interactions, and etc. More than ever, customers. Today use online reviews as a formal of social proof to validate their purchasing decisions. I mean, they trust our brands because of its good ratings and reviews. I think this shows us that it's not enough for your products to be good or for your prices to be fairer than the competition's. As a result, marketers are rethinking the traditional approaches to products like places pricing and promotions, and focused on keeping customer needs at the forefront to build up community to offer loyal fans. That's why it's crucial to cultivate it a specific plan for managing customer feedback. I would like to pinpoint that once things out a lot of a lot of when we talk about CX marketing is the use of CX cases in companies marketing contents. In other words, we see many companies using their CX for CX cases that go viral on social meeting increases incredible marketing campaigns. We have our recent case here in Brazil, super famous here. Brazil, often in the airline that went viral, a video that circulated on the Internet shows the scene of a flight attendant to pick up picking up baby who was was crying nonstop. She calmed him until he fell asleep. And yeah, in here is it brings a lot of CX because the attitudes and empathy of the the attendant, without a doubt became a memorable, memorable moment for the family in the others who are who are in the fight. So definitely these kinds of strategy here, we can see many things here in Brazil about CX marketing, by the examples by the case, so it's very hard to see here in Brazil.

Rick Denton: 16:09

What I like about the story that you've shared there is we hear stories of a company going exceptionally by yawn. And those are great stories, these surprise and delight moments, a real shocking moment. There are some really heartfelt make me cry type stories that are out there. But what I like about this story that you shared is the flight attendant didn't do anything amazing. The flight attendant didn't go shockingly, above or anything along those lines, the flight attendant, saw a customer in pain, a customer with a need, had empathy for that customer, and had a heart to just find a way to take care of that customer. And I love that that special, simple story is what has become the viral story for that airline. If I can tell you this, I would like to see more airlines do that. But what it tells me is that somehow in their hiring in their training in their focus on the customer, their flight attendants have this inherent heart for the customer that came out when they took care of that child and comforted that child. And certainly that parent is feeling love for that airline. Now my goodness, lays Let me switch on you a little bit here because I can't go any longer without just talking to you about Brazil. My memory as I mentioned 98 It's been too long, I have to get back down there. But I know that when I worked there, my experience was in Sao Paulo, which is a great city, but it's just one part of Brazil, Europe in the Bahia region. I would love to know more about that region and what a traveler up there should look to experience.

Laise Pôrto: 17:45

Yeah, I would choose a suspicious to say it but Brazil is a huge country and full of amazing place to explore. But speaking of Bahia, located in the northeast of Brazil, traveler has the opportunity to have unforgettable experiences here. We have a little bit of everything here. beaches, mountains, waterfalls, river, wonderful foods and about about all we the people by Yeah, who are simple, simply charming. So if you are a travel looking for heavily happy people, wonderful foods, a lot of this of the heat and definitely you need to know by ear for me, of course, the best place in both you

Rick Denton: 18:55

that makes me so want to go to buy and one of the things that I actually kind of appreciate and want to go, there is for me a flight from Dallas to Sao Paulo or to Rio is almost as long as a flight from Dallas to London, which is kind of surprising. You don't realize it but it really is almost that far. But if I were to fly by ear, I would actually cut a couple hours out of that flight I few maybe even more than a couple and so there's a closer opportunity to go there. So now I really want to go but I know this when I have traveled it is nice to take a little break. It's nice to head to the lounge that airport can be a little chaotic. So I would love for you to join me here in the first class lounge. Let's move quickly and we'll have a little bit of fun here. What is a dream travel location from your past?

Laise Pôrto: 19:41

One of my dream travel location from my past was San Andrés in Colombia. I have been I have been to there three years ago and I just fell in love with it. You guys have to To go to San Andres in Colombia, because it's amazing.

Rick Denton: 20:05

I am. This is one of the reasons remember how I started in the intro say, and I talked to a lot of folks from the US and Europe and I wanted to get more voices from around the world. I haven't had Colombia come up as an answer to this question. And I've wanted to go to Colombia, but I haven't heard about San Andreas. There's other places maybe Cartagena? No, no, no. Yes. Yeah. And then there's another kind of beach area that is highly recommended that I'd want to go to but I've not heard San Andreas. So that's a new one for the list. And I'm excited about what is now thinking forward. What is a dream travel location you've not been to yet?

Laise Pôrto: 20:39

It's very difficult to choose just one, right? Because I have a usually sharp place to go that I want to explore but dream travel without a doubt is to Bali, Indonesia. Yeah, because for me, it's because it makes us everything I love in a place connection with nature, cuisine, culture. So definitely a special place that tops the list of the upcoming destinations.

Rick Denton: 21:13

I like that one. Now. Barley has come up before that's a very popular one. It's certainly on my list as well. long flight for both you and me, but it's worth it to get out there. I've got to imagine now, we talked about Brazilian food. We talked about Brazilian culture, this question is going to be tricky, I'm sure but what is a favorite thing for you to eat?

Laise Pôrto: 21:31

As I told you, I love everything new. When I travel to Bliss. One of the things I like to explore is the food that is the food. But I have to give a super cheap here for those who will visited Brazil. You need to know by yet and it's cuisine. My favorite food that is definitely by young food. I cannot explain it but you guys need to try it and I'm sure you will remember my suggestion. Basically, we have seafood dishes with his eyes striking and different seasoning in addition to many delicacies so hashtag come to buy Yeah.

Rick Denton: 22:17

I feel like like he's I know you're not on the the tourism board. But I'm starting to feel like you might be on the buy he and tourism board with some of the ways you're telling me about this. This is nice. So favorite thing to eat just by eating food. Love it. Now let's go the other way. What is something your parents forced you to eat? But you hate it as a kid?

Laise Pôrto: 22:35

I grew up in a minute in a mixed family, with members from all over right? Yeah, these contributes to a lot to my growth, especially with my taste buddies. I don't remember my parents forcing me to add something, anything. We didn't have many choices, by the way. But we grew up learning to value our daily food and eating everything. My brother and I, my brothers and I have no restrictions. And we love to eat everything. So

Rick Denton: 23:15

I like that spirit. I like that, indeed. So nothing forced. It was all just a food to enjoy, and certainly appreciate the food that you had. That's awesome. You mentioned that you like to travel a lot. So you must have something what is that one travel item? Not including your phone? Of course. But what is that one travel item that you will not leave home without?

Laise Pôrto: 23:36

Wow, good question. I would say my credit card with it. I can't buy anything that is missing. But if I have to choose any another thing one night and that I can ever forget is my toothbrush? Definitely.

Rick Denton: 24:07

I like the idea of the toothbrush. Yes. A fresh start to the day in a cleaning at night. Certainly he is good. I know. So let's go back to kind of customer experience. And I saw a picture of you on LinkedIn wearing a hard hat and on the deck of what I think was a cargo ship near a Brazilian port. And that's not what many people think of when they think about customer experience. Now, I think that you and I share a similar philosophy around CX that it has to be woven through the entire company. So tell me about that visit to the port and why is it important to bring that customer experience thinking across the whole company even in areas where you wouldn't expect it to be needed?

Laise Pôrto: 24:47

The last five years of my career I work in ports, a logistics company with the challenge of starting CX from scratch. Among the many challenges I have the opportunity to guide the entire company to a new mindset and deploy a customer centric culture. This means that as a CX leader, I need to lead in initiatives from the board to the end of your operation. Yeah. Where the employees are, who in fact, are in the day to day work to deliver positive experiences to customers. In these moments that are you have seen was one of the workshops I held on on site with employees in the Operational Area bring bringing the voice of customers so that they understood the importance of their role in improving our customers experience. One thing that I always highlight in this process of business transformation is what I call the three p per spurred to the letter P is because the words in Portuguese begin with letter for me, but English would be sponsor partners and is pokers. Persons. They are the main things they are in the process. And that's how I've been working. In the other words, the customer centric culture process, we work hard with the sponsors, represented here by the top leadership's who buy the idea and will play a key role in the company's transformation. Partnership with the differences are areas so that the strategy is applied by everyone and spokespersons. Working here with multidisciplinary team with representatives from different areas of the company are kinds of customer experience, yeah, ambassadors, whose role is to disseminate the culture and to develop value added solutions for the customer. Through the improvement improvements deployed, we see x leads have this super important role in transforming and transforming the customer and the culture of the organization in partnership with top leadership. So these moments, especially in these moments, I was training the entire company to a new mindset, CX mindset.

Rick Denton: 27:56

I think that's so great to get all the way down that I spent time on cargo ships now in Port not actually at sea. And you wouldn't have that automatic reaction that that's where customer experience needs to be taught. But I love your say of going from boardroom to where the operations are happening. Absolutely. Got to do that frontline. I talk about that a lot. I'm curious. Can you say the three peas in Portuguese? I would like to hear them.

Laise Pôrto: 28:22

Pacitti Yeah. Botha roses bathro Cena duties.

Rick Denton: 28:31

That just makes me happy to hear it. It does sound better in Portuguese. So we may need to find a way to bring in that and get that. Let's just start using the three P's and the Portuguese language here in the in the US and across our English speaking worlds as well. That just sounded better. Lise, I'm taking a look at the clock. And we're out of time. So as much as I've got to several other questions that I want to ask you, I think we're out of time here. But I do want to ask you this as a voice of customer experience, they're in Brazil and Latin America, I imagine that people may want to get in touch with learn more, maybe even understand how they can bring customer experience to their way of doing things. How can people get in touch with you to learn more?

Laise Pôrto: 29:10

So you can looking for my profile on LinkedIn is Laise Pôrto. So you can looking for me on LinkedIn, and we can talk more about CX and career and leadership and what else?

Rick Denton: 29:36

Awesome. I'll get all that into the show notes so that as you're listening to this scroll down, click the link and you'll be taken right to Laise's LinkedIn profile. Laise, thanks so much for talking with me today. I love being able to get additional perspective on a region that isn't my region from a voice that isn't my experience edit. I just love being able to learn from what you're experiencing there in Brazil, Brazil and Latin America in general. Thank you for sharing the you know, certainly reminding us that, Hey, you gotta go boardroom to operations that was so important. It was interesting to hear how CX marketing is so important in the Brazilian culture and how experience the digital, and the human intensity of experience really matters in Brazil, and those who are looking to grow business in Brazil need to make sure that experience is top of mind. And then let's be honest, I really enjoyed hearing about by ear and I can't wait to find a way to book a flight, get there, have those beach experiences, enjoy that great food and enjoy that great culture. So Laise, thank you so much for being able to share that story. With me today and all the great information you shared with me today. Thank you so much.

Laise Pôrto: 30:40

Thank you. I really appreciate that and everyone you all are invited to explore by yet come to buy.

Rick Denton: 30:52

Thanks for joining us this week on CX Passport. Make sure to visit our website cxpassport.com where you can hit subscribe so you'll never miss a show. While you're at it, you can check out the rest of the EX4CX website. If you're looking to get real about customer experience, EX4CX is available to help you increase revenue by starting to listen to your customers and create great experiences for every customer every time. Thanks for listening to CX Passport and be sure to tune in for our next episode. Until next time, I'm Rick Denton, and I believe the best meals are served outside and require a passport.