"Trust is a result, not a promise": How to build a customer experience system

Most companies confuse good service with a customer experience system. Olga Omelchenko, Deputy CEO and Chief Customer Officer at Wilco, explains why 40% of clients leave after just two mistakes, how to pitch CX to a CFO, and why a premium experience does not end at the office door.

What CX is and why it is not just "polite service"

• Today, everyone is talking about customer experience, but it is often confused with standard customer service. Let's start with the basics: what is CX, really?

CX, or Customer Experience, is the sum of all impressions, emotions, and conclusions a person forms about a company at every stage of their journey: from the first advertisement and onboarding to resolving complex issues and reading quarterly reports.

Service is just one touchpoint, and most often a reactive one. CX, though, is a real system, a business discipline. It's a mix of processes, products, communications, and culture, built so the client isn't just comfortable, they're completely clear on what's happening, and can predict what comes next.

• What is the fundamental difference between simply good service and a mature CX system?

The analogy I find closest is food. Knowing how to cook well at home and knowing how to run a Michelin-starred restaurant are both about food and hospitality, but they are fundamentally different stories.

Good service is reactive. A client calls, and they receive prompt, polite, and competent assistance. Something breaks, the client reaches out, and everything is fixed for them. That matters, but it is not yet a system.

A CX management system is proactive. You know where a client might encounter friction before they even notice it themselves: you either fix it in advance, notify them beforehand, or design the journey so the issue never arises in the first place. Good service answers a call well. A system ensures that the call is never needed at all.

There is a figure from research by ISG and ResultsCX after which people usually stop arguing with me: 40% of banking clients are willing to leave after two negative interactions. Not ten. Two.

On building trust with experienced clients and brand positioning

• In 2025, Wilco underwent a rebranding and entered the market as a wealth management company. In this industry, trust is earned over years. How does a new brand build it from scratch?

 Almost no one believes a new brand in our industry at first, and I understand clients completely. The HNWI (high-net-worth individuals: wealthy private investors with a large volume of liquid capital, ed.) and UHNW (ultra-high-net-worth investors with a very high level of liquid capital, ed.) segment carries years of experience behind them: international banks, family offices, private banking across various jurisdictions, dozens of presentations promising that "this time it will be different." Any new player first looks like a risk, and only later, like an opportunity.

That is why I never start with creative concepts and slogans. I start with the question: why should someone entrust us with their assets right now, rather than stay where things are already familiar and safe?

The answer is never found in statements like "we're more client focused" or "highly professional," everyone says that. For an experienced client, a brand is not the impression left by advertising. It is the footprint left by our decisions: how we act during periods of market volatility, how we explain risks, and how we keep our word when the trend goes against us. The trust of experienced clients is always a result, never a promise.

Why "being right" doesn't mean "being profitable"

• How do you handle difficult situations, when a client is unhappy but is technically in the wrong themselves?

In the premium segment, being right and being profitable are far from the same thing. Sometimes the client genuinely makes a mistake. But most often, the business truly loses much earlier: the moment it makes its service complicated, communication confusing, and its processes impossible to understand without a lawyer.

A classic corporate excuse goes: "That is how our system is set up; we acted strictly within the regulations." Translated into plain language, this means: "We did not bother to make it clear, but we will blame you."

Let me give an example. A client was certain that the company had changed its fee structure without prior notice. In reality, he had missed a tariff update in one of the emails. Formally, the company was in the right: the notice was sent, and regulations were followed. On the client's side, however, there were three long emails, a complex tariff document, and a complete absence of simple human logic. At that moment, the stance of "the company is right" looks less like premium service and more like a fine-print trap.

The team could have said, "You did not read the notice." Instead, we restructured our communication: simplified the fee structure, made the commission presentation clear and visual, and honestly acknowledged that the previous notice had been too easy to miss, and that this was the company's responsibility. The client stayed with us and became even more loyal.

Being right flatters the ego. Understanding and respect bring in money. The choice is always the same: win the argument, or win the client.

How to pitch the CX idea to the CFO and the entire team

• Customer experience is often perceived as the function of a single department. How do you communicate its value to the whole company?

The main misconception is believing that CX lives in a separate office. It is a dialogue with the entire organization, you simply need to speak to each department in its own language.

In strategy sessions, everyone agrees that the client is essential. But, for instance, when it comes to the budget, the CFO asks: "Show me the ROI (return on investment, ed.); how does this impact the P&L (profit and loss statement, ed.)?" To finance teams, words like "trust" and "emotions" often sound like expenses without a clear return. That is why I stopped pitching CX as an "investment in loyalty" and started speaking the language of numbers: fewer operational disruptions, lower costs for handling complaints, more accurate planning, predictable LTV (Lifetime Value, the total amount of money or net profit a single customer brings the company over the entire relationship, ed.). Instead of asking for a big budget, I ask for a pilot, one area, with results I can show in 3 to 6 months.

Sales, on the other hand, lives on deals, while CX works for retention. Operations often view CX as an unnecessary add-on, right up until you show them that a significant share of their own workload involves fixing the fallout of a poorly designed onboarding process.

When a company truly pivots toward the client, it does not mean everyone simply became "nicer." It means everyone now shares a common language: unified data, end-to-end metrics, and decision-making logic that is clear to all.

Wilco's philosophy: experience beyond the office

• How is the CX philosophy embodied at Wilco today, as the company actively grows?

 At Wilco, we built CX into how we work from day one. For us, this is not just an internal standard for managing financial products, but a philosophy around which we bring together a community of like-minded partners, businesses that share the same values around quality, respect for people's time, and comfort.

A clear start for this philosophy has been our partner program, Wilco Compliments. We choose brands that create a seamless premium experience in their fields. For example, the restaurant Arleam Aero, located in the VIP lounge of Zvartnots International Airport, became one of our partners. Thanks to this, our clients experience Wilco's care and hospitality from the moment they arrive in Armenia to the moment they depart.

For us, customer experience does not end at the threshold of our office or within a mobile app. It is a holistic environment where the client understands that wherever they engage with Wilco and our partners, they can expect uncompromising quality, attention to detail, and respect.

Prices get copied. Product lines get copied. Financial instruments get copied. None of that stays an edge for long. What becomes the main, irreplaceable resource is the client's time. That's why CX stops being a nice bonus and becomes a must-have: the tool that protects a client's time, and the foundation trust is built on.

Olga Omelchenko has over 15 years of experience in private banking, working with the premium segment and HNWI and UHNWI clients. Since 2024, she has served as Deputy CEO and Chief Customer Officer at Wilco, the first company in Armenia to implement the Market Responsiveness Index, a global customer-centricity methodology. Olga is a certified Customer Experience Professional (CXPA) and holds a Master’s degree in Applied Psychology.

About Wilco

Wilco is a wealth management company providing investment services to high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs), family offices, and corporate clients. Wilco is regulated by the Central Bank of Armenia.