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Ambiente & Customer Experience in the Age of AI Platforms

Ambiente & Customer Experience in the Age of AI Platforms
Credits: Mariia Vitkovska

In a webinar held by Ambiente, the Digital Academy experts discussed what visitors can expect from the event and how AI is changing customer behavior in a digital world.

On January 21, the Messe Frankfurt Digital Academy hosted a webinar entitled “Customer Experience in the Age of AI Platforms” to prepare visitors for the Ambiente event. As the leading international consumer goods trade fair, Ambiente will offer lifestyle rhythms for visitors from February 7 to 11. The speakers began by providing listeners with insights into the consumer goods fair while recommending how to navigate the fair. Steven Van Belleghem, customer experience expert & award-winning author and entrepreneur, completed the webinar with a discussion about customer experience in the age of AI platforms.

Ambiente 2025 combines global trends, innovative designs, and a focus on living, dining, and giving. At the start of the webinar, Thomas Kastl, Director of Ambiente Dining and Dorothe Klein, Director of Content Consumer Goods Fairs, highlighted a few elements for visitors. The debut of a dedicated furniture segment, they explained, will showcase curated concepts and cutting-edge designs, including handcrafted and 3D-printed pieces. The Talent Area will feature exhibits by young designers, while Hall 3.1 will feature interior design, targeting modern home office solutions and personalized decoration ideas. Additionally, Hall 10’s Global Sourcing Platform offers insights into large-scale trade opportunities, cementing Ambiente’s role as a hub for innovation, networking, and forward-looking consumer goods. Here are a few companies to visit at the fair: Casa Bugatti, Broste Copenhagen, and Acht & Acht.

Now, let’s get into the customer experience in the age of AI platforms.

How AI Is Reshaping Customer Behavior

Steven Van Belleghem highlighted how AI is fundamentally altering customer expectations and interactions in the digital age. He emphasized that the rise of AI has shifted the competitive edge from technological innovation to customer-centric culture.

“The more AI becomes a commodity, the more critical it is to focus on customer culture,” Van Belleghem stated. ” 

This shift necessitates that businesses rethink their strategies to prioritize empathy, adaptability, and a profound understanding of their customers’ evolving needs. Van Belleghem underscored the importance of developing a mindset where customer satisfaction is ingrained across every level of an organization. 

“If your team believes you want to be truly customer-centric, they will naturally deliver exceptional experiences,” he noted. 

This cultural focus becomes even more crucial as AI increasingly handles repetitive tasks, leaving human interactions to deliver the emotional connections customers crave. He also stressed the need for businesses to harness AI’s capabilities to create smoother, more personalized customer journeys. By observing customer behavior in real time and translating these insights into value-driven actions, companies can ensure that technology enhances, rather than replaces, the human element. For instance, Van Belleghem advised companies to “observe clients in the wild” to understand their needs more deeply, a process that AI can support through predictive analytics and customer data.

Another key takeaway was the role of “effective empathy” in this landscape. This involves combining rapid feedback gathering with swift implementation of solutions to address pain points. 

“Combining fast feedback loops with fast action loops is the essence of creating effective empathy,” he explained. 

Through this approach, businesses can continuously refine their offerings and deliver the seamless experiences that customers increasingly expect in the digital age.

WATCH: 5 Customer Experience Trends for 2025 by Steven Van Belleghem

Bridging Technology and Empathy

Van Belleghem demonstrated how blending advanced technology with genuine empathy creates lasting customer loyalty. While AI brings efficiency and scalability, he argued that it is empathy that fosters trust and emotional connection. He likened this balance to the relationship between a rhino and an oxpecker.

“Businesses should be like the oxpecker on the back of a rhino: always present, but never intrusive, and adding value at exactly the right moment,” he explained.

To achieve this, he emphasized the necessity of mental flexibility within teams. He shared an example from Disneyland Paris, where a rigid adherence to rules led to a poor customer experience during a marriage proposal—when an employee swiped the ring, mid-response. Van Belleghem suggested that companies empower their employees to adapt to unique customer scenarios.

“Sometimes, you need a little bit of flexibility to make the right call,” he stated, highlighting how empathy and judgment can outperform even the most sophisticated algorithms.

The concept of “effective empathy” was central to his talk. Van Belleghem praised companies that excel at translating customer feedback into actionable changes quickly. He referenced a hospitality brand that starts each day with a meeting to review customer questions from the previous day and implement solutions immediately if the feedback has broader value.

“This rapid feedback-action loop is what separates companies that claim to care from those that truly do,” he noted.

Finally, Van Belleghem discussed the importance of creating emotional peaks in customer interactions. Inspired by “The Power of Moments” by Dan and Chip Heath, he explained how memorable moments can leave a lasting impression, even if every interaction isn’t flawless.

“Customers remember the peak moments and transitions. These are the keys to creating loyalty,” he said, urging businesses to identify and enhance these pivotal experiences.

By integrating technology with empathy, companies can build not just efficient systems, but meaningful, lasting relationships with their customers.

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