Hem: Our core customer is anyone aged 25 to 40 looking to make healthier choices and fitter. They’re not just gym-goers; they also are those who want more protein in their diet and a convenient way to consume it.

Perhaps they’ve tried the current whey proteins on the market but did not like the taste, or they dislike the inconvenience that comes with carrying a shaker and all that. It can feel intimidating, especially for those who are new to this. But trying a milkshake is not an intimidating concept for them. So that’s our target demographic.

Affiniv: Interesting. So they might have exposure to this category, but they find issues with, let’s say, taste or carrying around shakers, and you are making it tasty, at the same time, convenient for them.

Hem: Yeah, in the form factors which are close to their current consumption habits, like milkshake or, you know, chocolates. At the same time, taste is not very off compared to what they’re consuming right now, so it’s easier for them to integrate our products into their life.

Affiniv: Amazing. Isn’t it a great space to be in today’s era, when people are more health aware, but brands need to deliver on all fronts to delight them!

Hem: Well, of course, we want people to buy our products again and again. This could be through our website or any other channels. But the north star customer delight for us is whether they’re talking about us or not. Are they referring to us? Do they mention us and speak highly of our products when they’re using them in front of others?

Affiniv: So, what you’re saying is, offering great products that get repeat purchases isn’t enough. You don’t consider your customers delighted unless they become your promoters, your ambassadors.

Hem: Yes, that’s right.

Affiniv: That’s a fascinating way of looking at it.

Hem: First, I text every single D2C customer who orders from the website, on WhatsApp. Of course, I use some AI tools to send the first text. But once they reply, I respond to them myself, like each of these messages.

I talk to them after delivery and check if everything is fine. Operational issues are inevitable – leakages, packages breaking, and order delays. If they highlight any issue, I immediately solve it, irrespective of the time of day. And I try to give them whatever makes them happy.

Second is, in fact, before the delivery. We track the delivery promise for each customer. And if there’s a delay, the system automatically sends them an email and a WhatsApp message that your orders are running a little delayed, and we are working on it. The same communication also happens to the internal team, so that they can expedite the order.

And sometimes we realize, okay, this package is stuck somewhere, and it will take much longer. Then we go out of our way and try to arrange it from elsewhere. For example, we are present in gyms, right? Imagine that it’s raining in Mumbai and the package is stuck somewhere in outer Mumbai for a couple of days. So what we do is we’ll get it from a nearby gym, or a retail store, or maybe Instamart, Blinkit, wherever it’s there. We’ll order it, and we’ll deliver it to the customer.

We closely track the promise we make from the time we get an order, the delivery timeline, the quality of the product, everything. And make sure that we fulfil it.

Third is being honest. We’re a new company, and things sometimes don’t go as planned. For example, if a batch had issues due to something at the assembly or production line, and that batch goes to market. Then we, of course, rectify it, and then we make content out of it. What exactly happened? Why did a certain batch go bad, and what did we do to rectify it? We publicly acknowledge that something was a miss from our end. We put that content on social media and send it to all customers, regardless of whether they bought from this batch. So it is more like being honest. In the end, a brand is nothing but trust, right?

Hem: We don’t just talk about ingredients. In our category, clean and high-quality ingredients are table stakes now. We own up to our mistakes, and we highlight those through our content and social media, and that kind of content gets us the required customer love that we need.

And we also talk openly about our unit economics. For example, some subscribers want to negotiate for a lower price. We just tell them that this is our COGS, this is the delivery price, this is the warehousing cost, and this is how much we are making. So if that is all right with you, please allow us to make this much, because we also end up spending on other channels. And mostly these customers are people who understand, you know.

Affiniv: Yeah, nothing clicks more than being transparent and honest. The customers would absolutely love it.

I’m curious to learn, when you say, after every delivery, you reach out to the customers, is it more of an experience check-in, or something else?

Hem: It’s more of an informal conversation that I do. Like, we were a small startup, your feedback will help us grow and improve. If there are any mistakes or any issues that you found, please let us know. And in general, if you have any other feedback to share, please do.

Hem: Day 1! Because Prashant and I have worked with companies like Cult, where customer experience is a very important aspect. We’ve seen how much customer delight matters in the long term. Setting the tone in the beginning itself sets the DNA for the company as well.

And also for an emerging brand, you can’t just, you know, spend a lot of money to build awareness, and be present everywhere. That’s when you want people to become your ambassadors. You want those thousands of true fans who will talk about you. And as a brand, we genuinely care about what we’re doing for our customers. We are not here just for one transaction. In our category, you have to build multiple transactions and build that repeat rate. So, from a business point of view, customer delight is important. It’s mandatory for this category.

Affiniv: Isn’t that the most important DNA for a company! And if the founders believe it from day 1, that itself drives the culture within the entire team.

Hem: As of now, it has been more subjective as we didn’t have enough sample size to do things like NPS (Net Promoter Score). But from the coming quarter, we plan to start tracking NPS.

Affiniv: Got it. I hope you’ll consider Affiniv to automate your NPS loop.

Hem: Ohh yes, definitely!

Hem: Experience is the same for everyone. For repeat, of course, we’re a little more paranoid. For example, if somebody is like a subscriber, ordering for the 10th time, then we’re more alert about them to ensure delivery, etc., happens perfectly. But mostly it’s the same experience that we want to promise to everyone.

Look, on the repeat side, since we’re in the beverage category, the usual customer behavior is not to order from the website every time. Even if they order once from the website, next time they’ll try to find us on Blinkit or Instamart. And this is where tracking repeat becomes a challenge. But then we get some data from our category team. Based on that, despite being a new brand, our repeat rates are right now at par with the top brands, like Epigami and Yoga Bar, that have been in the space for the last 10+ years.

There’s another indicator that we’ve seen. Currently, 30-40% of our D2C revenue comes from subscribers. So there are people who order every single month. The idea is to increase the subscriber base, which will become a point proving that our customer experience is in the right direction.

Affiniv: Right. If people are willing to subscribe to your products, that is a testament to how much they like your brand.

Hem: Honestly, I don’t have a clear answer at this moment. But there are a few things that we have in mind.

One is, of course, measuring NPS from the coming quarter.

Second, it’s the DNA that we’re building. It will guide us. Our customer experience charter will be very deeply integrated with our brand and operations charters.

Today, we discuss each issue, but soon we will have a playbook. All the issues will be classified under a few issue categories. And then we will do RCAs for those issue categories and solve them. Having said that, issues will keep coming, but again, they will fall under one or two of such issue categories. And we’ll have a system in place. Like, if this happens, do that, and so on.

We’ll also assign a priority to each issue type, like L1, L2, and L3. L3 will be a very severe issue. Once L3 happens, some code red gets triggered. Everybody gets to know, the founders get involved. If L2 happens, the customer experience head gets involved. L1s, the team can manage at their level.

We also understand that for every issue, customers will not email us. They might just WhatsApp us on the company’s number. They might reply to system-generated messages. If that happens, the system will reply to them. And if a human interaction is required, we will enable that.

What we will do is use AI systems to read all these chats. Let’s say Claude will read these chats twice a week, gather all the insights, and create a document for us to review. That is the way we want to ensure that we are able to review all possible complaints comprehensively. And it will not just read WhatsApp, it will also read emails or any other channel where customers may complain, like Instagram, etc.

It will classify issues under categories and severity levels, and based on that, the desired people will get involved.

Affiniv: Basically, the idea is to gather customer feedback from every possible touch point, right?

Hem: Right.

Affiniv: One thing in particular that stuck with me is that you start your week with a customer experience review and everything else follows. That’s the gold standard. I have personally spoken to a lot of D2C brand founders, and I often find it missing. Most teams focus on sales. Many founders take growing sales as an indicator of good customer experience. But I do not agree with it because the sale might be growing due to so many other factors. You could be doing good marketing, or spending a lot on your acquisitions. But these are short-term.

A good customer experience is the only guarantee for long-term growth. And only a thorough CX review can tell you if your customers are loving you or not. If you get those inputs right, the sales will follow, but the other way around may not be true. If your sales numbers are growing, it doesn’t mean that your customer experience is good.

So, yeah, I truly appreciate that mindset. Congratulations, Hem, on building that mindset within the company and carrying it yourself from day zero. I’m sure that will take your brand to great success.

Hem: Thank you. Yeah, we do have a lot of other challenges. Let’s see.

Affiniv: I’m sure there are, but the right inputs driven by the right mindset will help you overcome them.

Hem: Zappos is one. I’ve never been their customer, but I’ve read their book, and their customer obsession stuck with me.

Then I’ve seen leaders like Mukesh at Cult talking about customer experience, something I could experience personally.

And then, in India, I totally look up to Taj Hotels. Of course, for a service industry, CX is the number one thing. But for products also, I think CX should be considered as the number one priority. So I am very impressed with Taj Hotels.

I think it’s more about how empathetic you are to the people whom you are serving.

Affiniv: Agree, for hospitality, customer delight is the de facto North Star metric. But that’s what every brand in every industry should be chasing.

Hem: When you serve the customers through various channels, you can reach out to some directly (D2C buyers). But for some others, you don’t get the data. For example, customers buying through quick commerce marketplaces. It’s a big challenge for us to ensure the best customer experience to our customers wherever they are. It’s a black box.

Also, there are certain channels, like retail, vending machines, or gym owners, where we supply. Now, in these cases, we don’t have one customer, but we have two customers at the same time. The person we are selling to, the gym owner, or let’s say the retail owner, and the person they sell to, the end buyer. So we need to take care of both of them.

For example, if we sell to a gym owner. We also need to take care of his or her experience. That means, upon getting an order confirmation, we should be able to supply them as soon as possible. And also, what can we do from time to time to keep these people happy? Like small gestures during festivals to make them delighted.

Affiniv: Right, so irrespective of the channel, irrespective of the ways of purchasing, irrespective of whether the buyer is an end consumer or not, customer delight is sacrosanct.

Affiniv: Thank you so much, Hem. Thank you for your time and for the insights. It was really good to learn how, from day 1, Nuvie has been obsessing over customer delight and customer experience. And there’s a clear long-term thinking when it comes to customer experience. All the best to Nuvie and to you personally.

Hem: Thank you. Best wishes to Affiniv as well.