By KPMG

According to KPMG’s Global Customer Experience Excellence Report, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has already become a reality for companies across multiple countries. Based on 80,594 interviews evaluating 2,684 brands in 16 regions, the report shows that AI is at the center of corporate priorities: 55% of CEOs identified investment in this solution as their main strategic focus — specifically to enhance customer experience.

“We are entering a new phase of customer experience, in which artificial intelligence moves beyond being a technological support tool and becomes a driving force of strategy. The rise of agentic AI accelerates the integration of customers, employees, and partners within a single intelligent journey, enabling real-time decision-making and far more consistent experiences. Organizations that succeed in unifying data, processes, and technology will be prepared to compete in a market where personalization will be fully automated,” explains Leonardo Giusti, KPMG partner.

Complete Experience as the New Model of Excellence

Full integration between data, processes, and technology forms the foundation of what is referred to as the “complete experience” — an approach that unifies customer-centric design, data-driven insights, omnichannel integration, employee empowerment, and a technological infrastructure that supports every interaction. The report highlights that organizations and leaders are not only meeting expectations but anticipating them, eliminating friction, and connecting the entire value chain with speed and empathy.

“The research revealed that the world is at an inflection point in the evolution of customer experience. Driven by the rise of artificial intelligence — capable of perceiving, reasoning, and acting autonomously — organizations are rapidly shifting from fragmented models to fully integrated structures built around a complete experience. This new paradigm connects, within a single intelligent layer, the experiences of customers, employees, partners, and all digital processes coexisting within the company,” Giusti analyzes.

Among the key findings of the survey:

• 6 out of 16 brands maintained national leadership in the customer experience excellence ranking.
• 50% of the brands belong to the retail sector, reinforcing the sector’s dynamism.
• 60% of leaders improved their customer experience excellence indices year over year, with an average increase of 3.1%.

“The data reinforce that brands treating customer experience as a strategic pillar achieve superior results. Seeing that half of the leading brands come from retail — and that most of them have advanced their indices — demonstrates that sustained excellence generates real impact. Competitiveness from now on will be defined by the ability to evolve continuously,” emphasizes Fernando Gambôa, KPMG’s Head of Consumer and Retail in Brazil and South America.

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