Blog
The thinking behind the advice. Research, conversations, and essays.
Everything here exists for one reason: to keep the advisory work grounded in what leaders and customers are actually doing right now.
Latest articles
AI, Not KPI.
The Waiting Time Your Service Dashboard Misses
A service team can respond promptly and still leave a customer waiting for the company to solve the problem. The gap often appears after the acknowledgement, when work moves into another queue, waits for a decision or sits between execution and confirmation.
Read · 3 min
AI, Not KPI.
Your AI Pilot Worked. That Doesn't Mean You Should Scale It.
A successful AI pilot can still fail at rollout if the receiving team has not accepted the work, proven capacity, or demonstrated how to pause safely.
Read · 2 min
CX Technology
One Leader. A Bigger Question for Buyers.
Medallia’s standout result deserves attention. But as AI collapses CX technology categories, buyers may need a different way to decide what belongs on their shortlist.
Read · 7 min
AI, Not KPI.
A Human Reviewer Needs to Know What They Can Approve Over AI
A service specialist receives an application that an automated workflow has flagged for review. The specialist believes the underlying classification is wrong, but the case record doesn't say whether they can correct the data, change the recommended action, or authorize an exception.
Read · 9 min
Market moves
CXM Software Could Be Gone in Five Years. Salesforce Just Showed Us Why.
Something important happened in customer experience technology this week, and the market has not fully absorbed what it means. In fact, most missed the news.
Read · 12 min
Operating model
2027 Customer Experience Technology Budget: How to Prioritize CX and AI Investments
AI spending is rising far faster than service budgets. Before companies lock their 2027 plans, they need a clearer view of what to renew, replace, consolidate, build, or stop funding.
Read · 9 min
AI in practice
Buy vs. Build Software: 5-Year TCO & Maintenance Costs
AI has made internal software easier to build. The harder problem to solve is who owns, maintains, updates, and funds it for the next 3-5 years. Here is a balanced way to model the real Buy vs. Build decision.
Read · 12 min
Market moves
The Medallia News Is Bigger Than Medallia
I advise some of the companies in this broader market. This piece is based only on public information, public announcements, public product pages, public market reporting, and my own read on where the category is headed. I’m not…
Read · 32 min
Market moves
A Good Asset Is Not the Same Thing As A Good Buy. Timing, As They Say, Is Everything.
Qualtrics announced (today, May 18, 2026) that it completed its $6.75 billion acquisition of Press Ganey Forsta as a major event in experience management, but I don't think it's for the reasons the press release wants people to…
Read · 15 min
Operating model
The Five Layers of the Future CX Tech Stack
Most CX programs are overbuilt at the bottom and underbuilt where money actually gets made; check out the image for reference. Is this…
Read · 3 min
Market moves
The End of Experience Management: How Private Equity, AI, and a "Kodak Moment" Are Reshaping the SaaS Landscape
The enterprise Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) market, specifically the Customer Experience Management (CXM) sector, is in the midst of a full-blown "Blockbuster" or "Kodak" moment. This is not a distant forecast; it is an active,…
Read · 22 min
AI in practice
CX Team of One? 0-to-1 with Anthropic.
I have been thinking a lot about AI’s impact on the CXM space, and not in the abstract way this topic usually gets discussed. I mean the real-world version, where CX is not a department with layers of analysts, researchers, and…
Read · 11 min
AI in practice
Buy vs. Build: What the Internal Software Business Case Usually Misses
I keep hearing some version of the same thing from companies right now: “We can build that ourselves.” Increasingly, they’re right. Give one or two really good engineers a month, access to the right data and APIs, and the AI…
Read · 15 min
AI in practice
Identity Is Becoming Core Infrastructure for AI-Powered Customer Experience
Most conversations about AI and customer experience still start with the model. Which model should we use? How much service can we automate? Should we build agents? How much will it save? How quickly can we deploy…
Read · 11 minThemes we follow
Customer-led growth
How organizations turn customer understanding into decisions about product, pricing, and service.
AI measurement and efficacy
What evidence actually proves an AI program is creating customer, operating, and financial value.
Operating change
Decision rights, ownership, incentives, and the routines that make change durable.
Original research and reports for experience leaders
Newsletter
AI is not the KPI. The customer is.
Bill's weekly essays on customer-led strategy, AI measurement, and the operating changes that make either real.