Innovation and human touch in Customer Experience
In this CX Minutes episode, we meet Sam Chandler, Head of Commercial Customer Success at Kustomer, who has spent over 20 years building CX organizations across startups and Fortune 500 companies. From Walt Disney’s popcorn bins to the Hooked Model, Sam shares why customer-centric innovation thrives when strategy meets empathy — and why automation should never replace your differentiator.
CX Minutes with Sam Chandler our host Sabina Persson, Custellence.
What’s covered in this episode
Guest insights
- The Hooked Model and designing for engagement
- Balancing automation and the human touch
- Customer-centric innovation and Walt Disney’s popcorn story
- Why zero-budget thinking creates better CX
Quick links
The Hooked Model and designing for engagement
For more than a decade, Sam has relied on Nir Eyal’s Hooked Model as a guiding framework. Originally built for product design, it explains how habits form — and Sam argues it’s just as powerful for CX.
Engagement doesn’t always mean meetings or calls. It can be as simple as interacting with resources, product features, or communities. Sam believes CX leaders should treat CX itself as a product: designed, tested, and improved like any other offering.
Related: AI Is Changing Customer Experience with Joanna Carr
Balancing automation and the human touch
Sam shares the truth: “Your customers don’t actually want to talk to you most of the time. They just want things to work so they can get on with their day.”
Every support interaction is a deflection moment. That’s why automation can help, but only if it reduces friction. The “little preferences” (chat, phone, email) matter less than the big preference: speed.
The goal is simple: design the fastest, clearest route to resolution, whether automated or human.
Customer-Centric innovation and Walt Disney’s popcorn story
To illustrate true customer-centricity, Sam tells her favorite Walt Disney story:
The lesson: literally walk in your customer’s shoes. Use tools like a Customer Pain Index to uncover hidden friction points, from billing delays to outages. Customer-centric innovation isn’t only about support — it’s about removing pain across the entire organization.
Related: Delivering The Right Products Means Walking A Mile In The Customer’s Shoes (Forbes)
More like this: The Danger of Assumptions in Customer Experience – Adrian Swinscoe
👉🏽 Start your customer journey map
Why zero-budget thinking creates better CX
Asked what she’d do with unlimited budget, Sam flips the question:
“I don’t ask what I’d do with unlimited budget. I ask what I’d do with zero. Because most support teams are fighting for budget every day.”
Big, flashy investments often create “McMansion” CX — expensive but not necessarily effective. Stripping things down to essentials reveals what really matters: the next step your customer needs.
Her advice to startups is clear:
Deep-dive: So You Have No Customer Experience Budget… Now What!? – Jeannie Walters, CCXP, CSP
Key Takeaways
- Apply the Hooked Model customer experience framework to design engagement into CX.
- Customers value the fastest path to resolution more than channel choice — it’s about balancing automation and human touch in CX.
- Walk in your customers’ shoes to uncover friction others miss.
- Think like you have zero budget to spark creative, efficient solutions.
“Do not automate yourself out of your differentiator.” – Sam Chandler
👉 Want to learn more? Watch the full Episode #12 with Sam here.
Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
What is the Hooked Model customer experience framework Sam mentions?
The Hooked Model by Nir Eyal explains how habits form. Sam applies it to CX by creating experiences that naturally drive engagement.
Why does Sam say balancing automation and human touch in CX is important?
Because customers’ true preference isn’t the channel — it’s speed and simplicity. Automation can help reduce friction, but human touch remains essential when complexity arises.
What is a Customer Pain Index?
It’s a way to track hidden friction points that cause customer frustration across the journey — not just in obvious areas like support or onboarding.
Final thoughts
The message is simple but powerful: don’t over-automate, over-spend, or over-complicate. The best CX comes from intentional design, balancing automation with human touch, and staying close enough to your customers to notice where the popcorn runs out.
AI Summary
Sam Chandler from Kustomer reveals why true CX innovation starts with simplicity. She shows how the Hooked Model drives engagement, why automation must never replace your differentiator, and how Disney’s popcorn bins prove the value of walking in your customer’s shoes. Her advice? Think like you have zero budget, stay human, and design experiences that just work.
Read the transcript
Note: This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability.
Intro
Sabina Persson (00:14)
Hi everyone, I am Sabina Persson from Custellence and you’re so very welcome to the videocast CX Minutes. It’s six questions, six minutes and it’s all about customer experience. This is a series of episodes where we bring you actionable insights, practical know-how, and personal stories from top professionals — all in just six minutes.
And I’m so happy to present my guest today, which is Sam Chandler from Kustomer. Hey Sam, how are you?
Sam Chandler (00:41)
I’m so good, thank you so much for having me. I can already tell we’re gonna have a lot of fun.
Sabina (00:47)
Me too. It’s great having you here. So, we’re going to jump into the questions — they’re about innovation and strategy.
Who are you and what do you do?
Sabina (00:53)
My first question is actually: who are you and what do you do?
Sam (00:59)
So, I’m Sam Chandler as you mentioned. I am at Kustomer and I head up our commercial customer success team. We’re building out a motion for our high-potential, low-spend customers that helps them use our products better — but also just hopefully be better at CX.
Before that, I’ve built a variety of customer success organizations in different places. Before that I built CX departments for startups. I’ve advised companies from teeny tiny all the way to fancy Fortune 500. And I just realized a few weeks ago that I’ve been in customer service in some shape or form for over 20 years — which is a terrifying thing to realize, but it’s good.
Sabina (01:59)
And you’re so young still, so you got 50 years to go, right?
Sam (02:07)
Yeah! No, I think customer service is somehow in my blood. I literally think I learned it from my mom. When it was time to get a job she recommended a store she had worked at, and I did that out of college. And here we are today.
Sabina (02:34)
Isn’t it funny how ways lead onto ways?
Sam (02:38)
Yeah, absolutely.
Is there a tool or framework you can’t live without?
Sabina (02:34)
Is there a tool or a framework that you can’t live without?
Sam (02:43)
There is. For the last 10 years, I’ve been obsessed with the Hooked Model by Nir Eyal. He’s got several books about this — it’s the thing he’s known for. It’s all about forming habits.
Usually it’s a methodology product designers use, but frankly, it works really well in CX and customer success. We forget that our services are also products — they should be designed like products.
So I think: what if we didn’t bombard our customers with emails until they shut us off? What if we designed an experience that made them want to engage with us?
All of the organizations I build, engagement is the foundation. It doesn’t have to mean talking to me or scheduling meetings. It could be engaging with the product, with resources, or making lifelong friendships. That’s the ultimate goal.
Sabina (04:17)
Oh, good answer!
How do you balance automation and the human touch?
Sabina (04:23)
So, how do you balance automation and human interaction — the human touch?
Sam (04:31)
Here’s a hard truth. Leans in… everybody needs to hear this: your customers don’t actually want to talk to you most of the time.
They want to live their life. And if you think about it, regardless of what product you support, if people need to reach out regularly to use it — we’re not doing a great job.
Every support interaction is a deflection moment. So we try to mitigate those as much as possible. Sometimes that’s talking to a person. Sometimes it’s automation or a product feature. A healthy mix is what matters.
There’s no single right answer. But here’s the rule of thumb: there’s little preference and big preference. Little preference is the channel: call, chat, TikTok even. The big preference is: “I just want this to work so I can move on with my day.”
So design your experience around the fastest route to resolution — and use every tool available.
Sabina (07:04)
Such a good answer in such a short time. Good job!
How does your organization approach customer-centric innovation?
Sabina (07:11)
How does your organization approach customer-centric innovation?
Sam (07:20)
I always think back to Walt Disney. My favorite customer journey mapping story.
When he was building his theme parks, he stood at the front gate with a bag of popcorn. He walked, ate, and when he finished he said: we need a trash can here. To this day, the distance between trash cans in Disney parks is the time it took him to eat that popcorn.
To me, that’s the most wonderful example of literally walking in your customer’s shoes.
I encourage organizations to do the same — really take the journey yourself. See the friction points. And then pair that with something I call a Customer Pain Index: not just mapping the journey, but identifying where you’re causing grief without realizing it.
It’s not just CX teams — it’s everyone. Billing, outages, email routing. It’s not about uptime percentages; it’s about how long customers can’t serve their own customers. How much revenue are you costing them? That’s the deeper truth of customer-centric innovation.
Sabina (10:10)
Absolutely, yes.
If you had unlimited budget, what would you try?
Sabina (10:19)
If your budget was unlimited, what’s one idea you’d love to try to improve CX?
Sam (10:27)
Here’s the funny thing — I flip that question. I don’t ask what I’d do with unlimited budget. I ask what I’d do with zero.
Most organizations, especially in support, have close to zero budget. And honestly, big budgets often lead to “McMansion” CX: expensive, overbuilt, but not good design.
Good design is often cheap. And when you think zero budget, you focus on essentials: what’s the next step the customer needs? What’s blocking them?
Sometimes it’s reconfiguring a journey. Sometimes it’s re-operationalizing. Sometimes it’s adding a tool. But the key is: don’t overspend where you don’t need to.
Sabina (12:58)
Oh, what a good answer.
What’s your one piece of advice?
Sabina (13:06)
Final question. What’s one piece of advice you’d share?
Sam (13:30)
This is what I tell startups: do not automate yourself out of your differentiator.
In tech, you’re either the disruptor or the disrupted. Startups often differentiate themselves through service. Don’t throw that away by over-automating.
Paul Graham says it well: do things that don’t scale. It sounds counterintuitive, but those little personal touches can scale further than you think.
And today we have the tools to embed personalization into automation. Customers expect it. So be intentional — automate where it makes sense, but protect the human element that sets you apart.
Sabina (16:04)
Beautiful. Thank you.
Wrap-up
Sabina (16:11)
Sam, it was such a pleasure speaking with you. Thank you for the energy, the insights, and of course your time.
Sam (16:34)
Thank you — we could have talked for hours! I look forward to more conversations about CX, automation, innovation, and strategy.
Sabina (16:49)
And Walt Disney trash cans!
Sam (16:54)
Exactly.
Sabina (16:54)
All right everyone, thank you for watching and see you next time. Bye!
Check out other episodes of CX Minutes here.
By Tove Lundell