What do customers want to feel in 2025

Welcome to 2025, the year when customer experiences transcend the ordinary. Gone are the days when a generic email blast or a simple loyalty program could win hearts. Today, brands must deliver more meaning and real personal value. They must answer a vital question: what do customers want to feel? The answer might not be the same for everyone. But it all starts with listening, innovating, and acting on emerging customer trends in 2025.

So we aim to explore the major 2025 customer experience trends shaping our landscape in this first blog post of the year. Whether you’re in banking, telecom, e-commerce & retail, insurance, or aviation & travel, these trends matter. They highlight what your customers truly expect from every product or service you offer.

Shifting Consumer Behaviors: The Roadmap to 2025

The business world moves fast. By now, we’ve seen how quickly consumer behaviors change. The global environment, evolving technology, and new social norms constantly push us to adapt yet the numbers are not optimistic. According to Forrester, this year, the average effectiveness of experiences fell to 64%, while the average ease of experiences fell to 66%.

These shifts can feel overwhelming. That’s why it helps to look at customer trends 2025 as a roadmap. They guide us through changing market demands.

According to various industry predictions—like those from Forrester and other thought-leaders—brands that prioritize CX leaders’ strategies are set to outpace their peers. They understand the power of customer engagement and appreciate the role of strong customer journeys. They see consumer trends evolving in real-time and make sure every step, from discovery to purchase, feels consistent and aligned with user expectations.

Yet, staying ahead isn’t just about technology. It’s also about emotion. What do customers want to feel by the time they complete an interaction with you? Some might crave a sense of belonging. Others look for efficiency and speed. Some want an in-depth brand relationship.

By observing consumer spending habits and the feedback from different markets, you can deliver a tailored experience that resonates on a personal level. This is the essence of hyper-personalization.

Hyper-Personalization: Making It Personal, at Scale

If you follow any customer experience (CX) discussions, you’ll notice hyper-personalization appears time and again. It’s a response to an overcrowded marketplace. Everyone is shouting for attention. Customers are tired of broad, one-size-fits-all messages. They want relevant offers, valuable content, and helpful service. They want brands to read between the lines of their behaviors.

Tailored Recommendations: Think of product suggestions based on past purchases or browsing history. For instance, a telecom company might detect a user’s preference for data-heavy packages, and then suggest an upgrade that fits their usage patterns.

Contextual Outreach: Some consumers hate spammy emails. Others welcome reminders if they’re about a special discount. By examining consumer behaviors, you can fine-tune your messaging to suit each audience segment.

Real-Time Adjustments: The best approach is continuous. It's about testing, learning, and recalibrating. That means collecting data from interactions across social media, apps, and in-store. Then, you adjust your offers or tone based on fresh insights.

McKinsey states that companies that grow faster drive 40% more of their revenue from personalization than their slower-growing counterparts. So in 2025, CX leaders are doubling down on personalization. They know it sparks deeper customer engagement while fostering loyalty. When people see real value, they return again and again. That’s how you turn occasional buyers into long-term advocates.

Generative AI: From Novelty to Necessity

For years, we’ve heard about AI-driven solutions. Some saw it as the future. Others felt it was hype. Now, generative AI has proved its worth across various industries. It’s no longer a sci-fi concept. It’s embedded in everyday tools, from chatbots that handle routine customer service queries to advanced analytics that detect anomalies in financial data.

Why is Gen-AI Gaining Momentum?

Speed and Efficiency: AI-powered systems can process data at lightning speed. They can generate product descriptions, draft personalized messages, and even predict user inquiries before they arise.

Cost Reduction: In some sectors, employing multiple human agents for repetitive tasks can be costly. AI-driven bots tackle mundane issues 24/7, freeing human talent for more complex tasks.

Enhanced Creativity: The term “generative” in generative AI speaks to its creative edge. It can craft new designs, marketing angles, or user flows that might not be intuitive to humans. It opens up fresh ideas for brand campaigns or packaging improvements.

But technology alone isn’t a magic bullet. The real value emerges when brands mix the best of machine efficiency with human empathy. Human agents still matter for nuanced inquiries and emotional connections. AI-driven solutions excel at tasks that require speed, data crunching, and pattern recognition. The synergy of both is what shapes top-notch customer experience trends.

Customer Service Reimagined: A Blend of AI and the Human Touch

Remember the days of waiting hours on hold, listening to dull elevator music? Those days are fading. In 2025, AI-powered chatbots resolve issues in seconds. Virtual assistants schedule appointments with ease. Yet, customers still want genuine human support for complex needs.

Simple Tasks: Use AI-driven chatbots to answer FAQs, track packages, or handle basic troubleshooting. This is especially effective in e-commerce & retail, where quick order updates can keep anxious buyers calm.

Escalation to Humans: If the bot senses frustration, it should swiftly escalate the chat to a human. In banking, for instance, clients might need a person for deeper financial advice.

Empathy and Understanding: Even the best AI can’t replicate the warmth of a concerned human. For emotional issues—like insurance claims after a crisis—it’s crucial to have human agents who can provide comfort.

Brands that blend automation with empathy see the highest satisfaction rates. They reduce wait times, meet logical needs, but still connect with people’s emotional side. This leads to stronger loyalty and better outcomes in the long term.

The Rise of Customer Journeys: Mapping Every Touchpoint

With so many channels available, from social media to offline stores, the modern customer journey isn’t linear. People jump from one platform to another. They read reviews, watch unboxing videos, and consult friends. They might browse on a phone, and then finalize their purchase on a desktop. That’s why you need a consistent message across channels.

Centralized Data: Keep all customer info in a unified database. When a telco user asks for help in the app, the agent should see their purchase history, preferences, and previous support tickets.

Smooth Transitions: If someone starts a query online, they shouldn’t have to repeat it if they move to phone support.

Personalized Path: Each person’s path is unique. In aviation & travel, for example, a traveler might begin searching for flights on a website, switch to a mobile app for seat selection, and contact chat support for upgrades. Map out these steps and tailor experiences to each stage.

Ensuring a seamless flow is no longer optional. It’s part of core customer experience trends. The brand that does this well stands out in a crowded market as it shows it cares about the entire journey, not just the final sale.

Why Customer Experience Is the Future

When we talk about 2025 customer experience trends, we don’t only mean fancy new tools or creative campaigns. It’s a mindset that focuses on building strong, lasting relationships. It’s about answering “What do customers want to feel?” at every stage. Whether they’re depositing money into a new account or choosing a seat on a flight, the goal is to enrich their life in a tangible way.

Brands that master customer experience see returns in the long term. That’s why 54% of chief marketing officers increased their budget for customer loyalty and retention this year. They drive loyalty. They reduce churn. They spark organic advocacy. They become part of someone’s daily routine. People trust them. People recommend them. People defend them.

In a year shaped by consumer trends, adopting an agile approach matters. Listen to your audience. Embrace new tools, like AI-powered solutions and generative AI, but never forget the human side. Keep focusing on customer engagement so they don’t drift to competitors. This combination of empathy, personalization, and innovation anchors modern CX trends.

Looking Ahead and Staying Competitive

We’ve seen many customer experience trends come and go over the years. But some fundamentals remain. People want convenience, efficiency, and a feeling that a brand sees them as individuals. As we head deeper into the future, keep these strategies in mind:

Leverage AI, Maintain Humanity: Leveraging AI is vital for growth, but always keep human agents ready for critical touchpoints.

Deliver Hyper-Personalization: Use data, machine learning, and gen-AI to create experiences tailored to each user.

Stay Flexible: The next big disruption can arrive at any time. Be ready to pivot your product or service offerings fast.

Focus on Value: Don’t just sell. Solve real problems. Answer what customers want to feel when they do business with you.

Think Long Term: Great customer experience is a marathon, not a sprint. Build trust step by step.

How Evam Empowers Customer Experience

Evam’s real-time omnichannel martech platform, evamX, brings all your customer touchpoints into one intelligent marketing hub. With evamX you can design and run real-time, batch, or hybrid campaigns and win customers’ hearts by being there whenever they may need you the most.

The AI-powered customer journey orchestration and design platform equips you with six powerful modules:

Journey Designer: Craft end-to-end customer journeys with ease. Visualize, plan, and deploy multi-channel campaigns that adapt to real-time user behavior.

Digital Engagement: Curate seamless, personalized experiences across the web, mobile, and more. Design effective push notifications, SMS campaigns, and tailored web interactions visually and generate content with gen-AI to delight customers.

Insight Tracker: Monitor performance at every step of your customer journey. Gain real-time metrics that help refine strategies and uncover hidden opportunities instantly.

Customer Feedback: Collect feedback when it matters most. Design and trigger surveys to listen to customers after critical interactions, then optimize journeys based on their voices.

NBX Decisioning: Harness AI-driven insights to predict customer needs. Offer next-best actions that feel uniquely personal and relevant.

With evamX, you’re ready to build remarkable customer experiences. Get in touch to discover our comprehensive solutions and learn how we can help you elevate customer engagement and meet your KPIs in 2025.