How Poorly Performing Tech Harms Customer Experience

As 75% of growth leaders report pressure to reduce technology spending, many are learning a hard truth: cutting corners on technology can cost more than it saves. When systems underperform, the customer experience suffers, and so does revenue, retention, and reputation.

The root cause often hides in your technology stack: outdated platforms, siloed data, patchwork integrations, or tools that weren’t built to scale. Improving these issues isn’t always about finding new tools. It’s about aligning your technology to deliver smarter experiences, drive efficiency, and support strategic growth across every part of the business.

Here are the most common technology pitfalls we see organizations facing today that impact customer experience — and what you can do to fix them.

1. Poor Personalization Damages Trust

When personalization engines malfunction due to incomplete data, poor system integration, or misaligned algorithms, the result is a disjointed journey: irrelevant recommendations, duplicate outreach, or messaging that doesn’t match behavior.

How to fix it:

Invest in system integrations that give you a single source of truth. Personalization isn’t just for marketing; it’s an operational capability for finance, fulfillment, and service, too.

2. Subpar Automation Wastes Time

AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants are revolutionizing customer service by providing instant, round-the-clock support. When working well, these intelligent systems can efficiently handle routine inquiries, resolve issues, and even make product recommendations based on customer queries and past interactions.

According to the Salesforce State of Service report, 93% of service professionals say AI saves them time.

But AI is only valuable if it is built and deployed correctly. When automation tools are clunky or misinterpret customer needs, they frustrate both customers and employees by creating more work, not less.

What to do:

Redesign workflows with the end-to-end journey in mind — not just departmental goals. Then use automation strategically to remove repetitive steps, eliminate bottlenecks, and create a seamless handoff between teams and tools.

3. The Purchase Process Feels Like Work

In an era of one-click checkout and subscription simplicity, a clunky buying experience sends customers elsewhere — fast. Whether B2B or B2C, customers expect ease at every step.

The problem usually isn’t customer demand; it’s backend disconnect:

• Manual quote-to-cash processes
• Disjointed billing and payment systems
• Siloed sales, finance, and fulfillment tools

How to fix it:

Simplify and align your quote-to-cash process. When you streamline the full revenue engine, you can eliminate friction with connected finance, sales, and service systems that give internal teams visibility and customers confidence.

4. Inaccurate or Inaccessible Data Leads to Poor Decisions

Outdated, inaccessible, or inaccurate data leads to flawed decisions. You can’t anticipate needs, identify at-risk accounts, or personalize engagement if your data is incomplete or buried across systems.

Even organizations with the right tools often lack the strategy to use them well. Growth, M&A, and system sprawl can leave data governance in the dust.

Your organization needs a cross-functional data strategy that prioritizes accessibility, quality, and security.

5. Underperforming CRMs Increase Churn Risk

Retention isn’t just a marketing KPI, it’s a full-business metric. When CRM systems underperform, your ability to identify, engage, and retain customers declines rapidly. And that’s a high-stakes risk. It’s far more expensive to acquire new customers than to retain existing ones, and most loyalty efforts fail not from lack of intent, but from lack of execution.

Customer behavior signals are often missed or misread because they’re spread across disconnected platforms. Support logs, product usage, billing history, and marketing interactions aren’t telling a cohesive story.

Build systems that allow you to track, analyze, and respond to customer behavior holistically — not just in silos.

The True Cost of Tech Shortfalls

Technology can significantly enhance the customer experience, but only when it works well. Poorly implemented or underfunded systems create friction, undermine trust, and weaken operational alignment. The result? Dissatisfied customers, increased churn, and lost growth opportunities.

At Eide Bailly, we help organizations assess, align, and optimize their technology stacks — ensuring they drive real business value, not customer experience setbacks.