In this episode of the Earley AI Podcast, host Seth Earley welcomes Eric Rehl, Vice President of Digital Customer Experience in North America at Schneider Electric. With over 25 years of expertise in digital strategy and customer experience, Eric has guided global organizations through complex digital transformations, always keeping business outcomes and customer needs at the core. Drawing on his deep industry knowledge, Eric shares how large enterprises can move beyond buzzwords like “digital transformation” and “AI,” instead choosing a pragmatic, data-driven approach to drive real business value.
Join Seth and Eric as they discuss the evolving role of digital capabilities in business strategy, the foundational importance of high-quality data, the unique challenges faced by B2B organizations, and how AI can power truly personalized customer experiences—from the ground up.
Key Takeaways:
Digital transformation should be rooted in business outcomes, not technology hype; focus on the “so what” for your customer and organization.
Strong, clean, accessible data is critical for scaling digital experiences and enabling AI-driven personalization—without it, even the best tools will fail.
B2B companies often lag in digital maturity due to legacy data architectures and complex customer relationships, but can catch up by investing strategically in foundational capabilities.
A robust digital journey relies on operationalizing and continually improving product and customer data, rather than one-off fixes.
Maturity in B2B digital experiences evolves from simply “doing no harm,” to enabling ease of business, and ultimately leveraging digital platforms for growth and commercial impact.
AI’s promise lies in moving from segmented personalization to real-time, dynamic customer engagement powered by integrated data and knowledge.
Preparing for AI-driven customer discovery means syndicating high-quality, semantically-structured content across channels—both on and off your own domain.
The next frontier is operationalizing knowledge (not just product or customer data) to fuel AI tools for differentiation and problem-solving.
Continuous experimentation and responsible opportunism allow organizations to discover new outcomes and business value.
Insightful Quotes:
"I think as you start building maturity, you're learning how to orchestrate those pieces. You're getting more of that harmonization of organizing principles across those disparate departments, across knowledge and content and customer experience and product information. And so that becomes kind of the holistic journey that you're thinking about." - Seth Earley
“We always start with the outcome. Like, why are we talking about capabilities here? Why are we talking about AI? What are we actually going to do with it to get to what the business outcome we’re trying to drive or the experience outcome we’re trying to drive?” - Eric Rehl
Don’t miss this in-depth conversation packed with practical advice and forward-looking insights for anyone leading or navigating digital transformation initiatives in the AI era.
Links
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericrehl/
Website: https://www.se.com/us/en/
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