5 Questions to Ask Before Building Your 2027 CX Strategy

Before setting next year’s CX goals, take a closer look at what your customers are experiencing today.

Annual planning naturally pushes organizations to look forward. Leadership teams begin discussing new goals, budgets, KPIs, technology investments, training initiatives, and opportunities for growth.

When it comes to customer experience, however, we believe one of the most important parts of planning for the future is understanding the present.

At BARE International, we work with organizations around the world to measure what customers actually experience, identify where expectations and execution diverge, and turn those findings into actionable business intelligence. One lesson we see repeatedly is that a strong CX strategy cannot be built on assumptions.

Before deciding what customer experience should look like in 2027, organizations need a clear picture of what it looks like today.

As planning conversations begin, here are five questions we recommend bringing to the table.

1. What Are Our Customers Actually Experiencing Today?

Most organizations have a clear idea of the experience they intend to deliver.

There are brand standards, training programs, service expectations, operational procedures, and customer journey maps.

But intention and execution are not always the same.

The more valuable question is whether those expectations are consistently translating into real customer experiences.

Consider what happens when a customer enters a location, contacts a service team, completes a transaction, interacts with a digital channel, or needs assistance. Are the behaviors and standards designed by the organization actually showing up in those moments?

This is why establishing a current-state baseline is so important.

Before setting improvement targets for 2027, organizations should have objective visibility into what is happening across the customer journey today. Mystery Shopping, Customer Satisfaction research, operational audits, and other forms of CX measurement can help replace assumptions with evidence.

You cannot accurately measure improvement if you do not know where you started.

2. Where Are We Losing Consistency?

Averages can tell an important story, but they can also hide one.

An organization may have a strong overall customer experience score while individual locations, regions, teams, channels, or touchpoints tell a very different story.

That is why we encourage organizations to look beyond the topline number.

Perhaps one region consistently delivers an exceptional welcome while another struggles. Customers may have an excellent digital experience followed by a frustrating in-person interaction. A service standard may be performed consistently during one part of the customer journey but frequently missed during another.

These variations matter because customers do not experience an organization through an average score. They experience individual interactions.

As you prepare for 2027, identify where consistency breaks down and look for patterns behind those differences.

The goal is not simply to find poor performance. High-performing locations and teams can be equally valuable. Understanding what your strongest performers are doing differently can reveal behaviors and practices that may be replicated elsewhere.

Consistency turns a great customer experience from an isolated success into a repeatable business standard.

3. What Matters Most to Our Customers?

Not every moment in the customer journey carries equal weight.

Organizations often dedicate significant resources to measuring what is easiest to track rather than what has the greatest influence on the customer experience.

Those are not always the same thing.

One of the most valuable questions leaders can ask during strategic planning is:

“Which moments, behaviors, and interactions have the greatest impact on how our customers perceive their experience?”

Customer feedback can help reveal what customers value, where friction occurs, and which interactions influence satisfaction. When those insights are combined with observational and operational data, organizations gain a much richer understanding of the experience.

This distinction becomes especially important when determining where to invest.

If a particular interaction consistently influences satisfaction, loyalty, or customer perception, that insight should help inform training, operational priorities, measurement, and resource allocation.

A successful CX strategy does not attempt to improve everything at once. It identifies what matters most and focuses attention accordingly.

4. Where Are Our Biggest Experience Gaps?

Once you understand what customers are experiencing, where performance varies, and what customers value most, the next question becomes clearer: where is the experience falling short?

At BARE, we often think about CX gaps as the distance between two realities:

Brand promise and customer reality.
Standards and execution.
Customer expectations and actual experiences.
Customer priorities and organizational priorities.

A gap does not automatically mean something is fundamentally wrong with the business. In fact, identifying one can be extremely valuable.

A gap creates visibility, and visibility creates an opportunity to improve.

The challenge arises when organizations enter another planning cycle without recognizing those disconnects. The same service inconsistencies, operational misses, and customer frustrations can quietly follow the business into another year.

This is where multiple sources of customer intelligence become particularly powerful. Mystery Shopping may reveal whether a standard is being executed. Customer Satisfaction research may tell you how customers feel about the interaction. Audits may uncover operational or compliance issues. Competitive Intelligence can provide context for how your experience compares within the marketplace.

Looking at these insights together can help organizations move beyond identifying symptoms and begin understanding what is driving them.

“BARE International has been instrumental in our success by allowing us to monitor our service and make immediate adjustments.”

– COO, Health and Fitness Franchise

5. What Should We Measure in 2027?

This question should come after the first four, not before them.

Organizations often enter annual planning with an established set of KPIs and carry those measurements forward automatically.

But a new planning cycle creates an opportunity to ask whether those metrics still answer the questions the business needs answered.

Are you measuring the behaviors that influence the experience?
Can you identify differences across locations, channels, or customer journey stages?
Are you capturing both what happened and how customers felt about it?
Can your data help leadership determine where action is needed?
And ultimately, does the information you collect help your organization make better decisions?

The right measurement strategy will look different for every organization.

For some, Mystery Shopping may provide the clearest visibility into execution. Others may need deeper Customer Satisfaction research, Audits, Competitive Intelligence, or a combination of methodologies.

“There is no one-size-fits-all approach to measuring customer experience. The most effective programs are built around what an organization needs to understand, the decisions they need to make, and the experiences that matter most to their customers.”

— Michele Jowdy, Global Business Development Manager, BARE International

The goal is not to collect more data simply because more data is available. The goal is to build a measurement strategy that produces useful intelligence.

Better Questions Build Better Strategies

Your 2027 customer experience strategy does not need to begin with all the answers. It should begin with the right questions.

Before determining where you want to go next year, understand where you stand today.

What are customers actually experiencing?
Where is performance inconsistent?
What matters most to your customers?
Where are the gaps?
What information will help you make better decisions going forward?

Starting these conversations before the year-end rush gives your organization time to establish a meaningful baseline, gather the right intelligence, identify opportunities, and build priorities based on evidence rather than assumptions.

At BARE International, our role goes beyond collecting customer experience data. We help organizations understand what that data means, connect insights across the customer journey, and determine how those findings can support smarter business decisions.

Because the strongest 2027 CX strategies will not simply define where organizations want to go; they will be grounded in a clear understanding of where their customers are today.

Start Building Your 2027 CX Strategy

Ready to understand your current customer experience and identify the opportunities that should shape your 2027 priorities?

Talk with BARE International about building the right CX measurement strategy for your organization. https://www.bareinternational.com/request-a-quote/

At BARE International, we pride ourselves on helping businesses decode customer behaviors. Whether it’s uncovering hidden trends or designing feedback loops for continuous improvement, our research empowers brands to stay ahead of the curve.

Reach out to us today to explore how our tailored research can take your CX strategy to new heights.

Tell us about your business and what keeps you up at night. We can help.