Building a Culture of Customer-Centric Excellence at TABtouch
This case study showcases how Scalabl led a large-scale cultural transformation at TABtouch - building internal expertise, embedding human-centred design practices, unlocking deep customer understanding, and piloting new ways of working to re-orient the business around customer.
Our video case study features TABtouch team members sharing their experience partnering with Scalabl on building a culture of customer-centric excellence. This is the human side of transformation.
Context
The WA TAB has been a key part of Western Australia's wagering landscape since 1961 (now TABtouch). However, the rise of corporate bookmakers from 2008 reshaped the national market, expanding it from $20 billion in 2007 to $52 billion by FY22. These agile, low-cost operators quickly captured significant market share, leading to major industry consolidation.
In WA, prolonged uncertainty around a potential sale of the TAB shifted focus towards short-term financial performance, delaying critical long-term investments. While tactical improvements delivered gains in customer numbers and brand recognition, they did not position the business for sustainable, customer-led growth.
In pursuit of sustainable growth and a stronger customer focus, the Bettering Department - responsible for operating TABtouch - launched the Customer-Centricity Initiative in FY24, aligned to the Wagering Strategy (April 2023). This initiative aimed to embed human-centred design practices, build internal expertise and deep customer understanding. Alongside this was to foster a customer-first culture, ensuring evolving customer needs drive decision-making and innovation.
“We needed to be more customer-centric but we didn’t know how to approach that. We needed advice, first of all, on how to begin that journey.”
Every journey of change begins with knowing where you are.
A clear understanding of the current state is critical for setting a credible path forward.
Our Discovery phase provides an objective view of the current state - highlighting the strengths to build on, the gaps to close, and where to prioritise focus. It replaces assumptions with evidence and lays the foundation for a roadmap towards meaningful change.
Understanding the Ecosystem
A discovery deep-dive was undertaken to assess the current state of customer-centricity across the Bettering Department.
The process involved engaging representatives from key business units who regularly interact with end customers across multiple channels and touchpoints.
Through structured conversations, the team explored existing processes, tools, capabilities, customer interactions, and levels of customer understanding. This insight was complemented by observation and a department-wide diagnostic survey, assessing maturity in customer-centric practices.
Participants openly shared their knowledge, observations, and experiences, which were synthesised to build clear recommendations and the roadmap towards greater customer-centricity.
“Scalabl gave us insights from a non-biased view, which was really great for us because once you’re inside the organisation, you see it from a different angle, or you don’t see it at all, because you’re seeing it every day.”
Mapping Customer Ecosystem Interactions & Customer-Centricity Baseline Diagnostic
Starting the journey toward a customer-centric TABtouch meant confronting big challenges. How do you transform an organisation, where decision-making has traditionally leaned towards commercial outcomes, into one centred on deep customer understanding - in a highly competitive, rapidly evolving market?
Our approach leveraged insights from Discovery to develop the Customer-Centricity Roadmap: an incremental plan to build internal expertise, embed human-centred design (HCD) practices, and connect teams more closely to evolving customer needs.
The first priority was getting the foundations right. Increment One of the roadmap was to develop an Intimate View of the Customer - building deep, evidence-based insight into customer behaviours, needs, and experiences - and embedding HCD capabilities within the Department.
TABtouch could then confidently progress to Increment Two: developing a data-informed, targeted customer strategy.
Increment Three integrates the insights and strategy developed in earlier increments by launching a pilot value stream aligned to a key strategic opportunity. A cross-functional team applies customer-first ways of working to deliver meaningful improvements, demonstrating the impact of customer-led thinking on experience optimisation and business outcomes.
Increment Four focuses on scaling the pilot success - progressively re-orienting the business around the customer and embed these ways of working more broadly.
Discovery turned the complexity of the wagering business and customer ecosystem into a clear, incremental roadmap toward customer-centricity.
Historically, TABtouch relied on external agencies for customer research - creating a critical gap in internal capability and customer connection.
A key goal of the Customer-Centricity Program was to address this gap, with a critical focus on embedding human-centred design (HCD) practices and capability within the Bettering Department.
Central to this effort was the Intimate View of the Customer initiative - not just a research program to build a deep understanding of customers, but a vehicle for building internal capability and expertise. Under Scalabl’s leadership, the team was guided and supported through a thorough end-to-end process - from research planning and structured customer engagement, to synthesis, journey mapping, persona development, and embedding the insights across the business to ensure lasting impact and quality outcomes.
By deeply engaging with customers and applying HCD methods hands-on, the team gained direct exposure to customer needs, behaviours and experiences - building practical skills and confidence. This experience began shifting mindsets, strengthening customer empathy, and laying the foundations for customer-led decision-making across the department.
Approach to the Intimate View of Customer Research Fieldwork.
The Intimate View of Customer
Building a Deep Foundation for Customer-Centric Growth.
The Intimate View of Customer initiative was a large-scale customer research program launched to develop an up-to-date, evidence-based understanding of TABtouch’s current, former, and prospective customers.
Focusing on motivations, behaviours, needs, pain points, and interactions across all TABtouch channels, the initiative set out to define key customer personas, map critical steps, touchpoints, behaviours, and emotions across the customer journey, and identify pain points, delight points, and service gaps to inform future improvements.
This work uncovered opportunities to enhance customer experiences across the business and lay a living foundation for more customer-led decision-making.
Not just research - a blueprint for how to connect with customers
To build the Intimate View of Customer, Scalabl guided the TABtouch team through a structured and rigorous process.
Over several months, the team captured and analysed insights from 115 qualitative interviews, 1,925 survey responses, and extensive internal transactional data. Using human-centred design (HCD) principles, a robust suite of personas were developed by systematically profiling customer types, mapping journeys, identifying patterns, and cross-validating findings through both qualitative insights and behavioural data.
Progress and insights were regularly shared with the broader business through showcases, bringing teams along the journey and building organisational understanding of customer needs and a HCD process.
Bringing Customers to Life: Personas and Journeys
Research and analysis highlighted five clear groupings of customers and eleven nuanced customer personas.
These personas and journeys not only bring customers to life, but also create a consistent, human-centred view across the business - supporting more targeted service delivery, highlighting pain points and opportunities, and sharpening focus on the needs that matter most.
One of the 11 Personas Produced & Corresponding Customer Journey.
“We started by understanding who our customers are through the persona work, and that has now led us to make decisions about how we align teams around the customer - beginning with an experiment involving a dedicated team focused on delivering customer outcomes for retail.”
Mobilising the Pilot Value Stream
Applying Customer-First Ways of Working
Building on the foundations laid through the Customer-Centricity roadmap, Scalabl helped TABtouch design and launch a pilot value stream to apply customer-first ways of working to a key strategic opportunity: enhancing the in-venue retail experience.
A cross-functional team - spanning product, technology, marketing, data, and analytics - was established to deliver meaningful improvements. The team used human-centred design (HCD) principles, data-driven insights, and a relentless focus on customer needs to guide prioritisation and action.
Scalabl played a critical role in coaching the team, shaping the direction and establishment of the value stream, leading the research efforts, and establishing a reusable operating model to enable fast experimentation, customer validation, and continuous improvement.
Early results from the pilot have already demonstrated the value of customer-led thinking, reinforcing the link between customer focus, experience optimisation, and business outcomes.
A TABtouch staff member observing a customer during research.
Outcomes of the Customer-Centricity Journey
Laying the foundation for long-term, customer-led transformation
Over the course of the Customer-Centricity journey, Scalabl helped TABtouch make significant strides towards embedding customer-centricity at the core of its operations:
Developed a deep, evidence-based understanding of customers - culminating in eleven detailed personas and journey maps that now inform strategy, design, and decision-making.
Built internal capability in human-centred design (HCD) through hands-on research, synthesis, and pilot delivery activities.
Shifted organisational mindset and culture by involving the broader business in customer research, showcases, and co-design activities - driving greater empathy and customer connection.
Established a pilot value stream focused on enhancing the retail experience, demonstrating how customer-first ways of working accelerate innovation, responsiveness, and business outcomes.
Established a reusable value stream operating model and scalable foundation for embedding customer-led practices across the Bettering Department.
Measurable Impact
Customer Maturity Shifts
+15% uplift across all 12 diagnostic measures of customer maturity. +28% average uplift across the Value Stream Pilot
Strengthened Customer Understanding
+81% of staff agreed the new personas helped them better understand customers
Commitment to Customer-Centricity
+19% uplift in commitment to putting customers first. Customer-facing teams scoring 9.15 out of 10
Improved Ways of Working
88% saw improved innovation & experimentation
79% reported stronger customer focus & collaboration
75% greater adaptability, faster delivery & better outcomes
71% reported improved ownership & accountability
63% indicated higher employee engagement
Customer-Centricity at TABtouch. Establishing the Foundations and Blueprint for Customer-Centric Excellence
With Scalabl’s guidance, TABtouch built a deep, evidence-based understanding of its customers, embedded human-centred design across the Bettering Department, and launched its first customer-centric value stream.
The result? Tangible behavioural shifts embedding customer thinking into everyday decision-making, operational improvements in how customers are engaged and served, and an scalable blueprint to drive long-term, customer-led transformation - enabling TABtouch to become a more responsive, adaptive organisation, better positioned to outpace the competition.
This partnership delivered more than insight - it built capability, demonstrated measurable impact, and laid the foundations for sustainable, customer-driven growth with real momentum for the future.
“We need to continue this journey - we’ve been taught how to do it now. I’m hoping that one day Scalabl will come back and see how what started as a small seed has grown. And in five years’ time, they’ll see how far we took it, building on the foundation they helped us create.”