Great Customer Experiences Ready to Apply

A lot has been said and speculated about user experience but it is still a mystery that many top, senior and mid-managers don’t take it seriously endangering their companies of a bright future due to their lack of understanding.

Matt Watkinson in his book “The Ten Principles Behind Great Customer Experiences” says“The customer experience is the quality aspect of any interaction that an individual has with the business, its products or services at any point in time.” Is worth to remember user experience is not limited when the customer purchasing the product or service, and on the use of it. In reality it starts when the user is first exposed to the product or service and goes on until the customer does not need the product or service anymore. It involves any interaction with the brand, product or service.

Does it ring any bells now how important User Experience is?

The most successful companies of our days such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, Mercedes, Audi and BWV cars, etc. They all understand that every interaction with the customer have to be taken into account and they deliver outstanding products or services because they care to make those interactions as pleasant and stress free as possible to the customers.

As customers we usually respond with appreciation when business seems to care. If you don’t believe me, think about any good or great experience you had when intreating with a service or product that has shown small details of appreciation for your business; when they present you with a pleasant experience that you still remember and whenever possible would like to experience again. All of us have had some, even if just once in a lifetime. Wasn’t that great? Wasn’t something you would like to share with others and would come back for more?

If you remember a great experience you had with a product or service, there you have the answer of how important the issue is.

Matt Watkinson’s book is an excellent resource for those who wish to understand better how great customer experiences are made and learn how to create it for your customers. Here are a summary of Watkinson’s ten principles of great customer experiences:

1. Strongly reflect the customer’s identity - our behaviours are guided from our beliefs and values. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
2. Satisfy our higher objectives - We all have primarily objectives or goals that we are aware of and the hidden ones that in many cases we don’t even know they exist. The 5 whys technique helps to uncover our customer’s explicit and hidden objectives that are crucial to determine what are the real reasons why they choose us. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
3. Leave nothing to chance - No detail is too small to be unnoticed and all the customer interactions need to be planned in order to be right.
4. Set and then meet expectations - know what our customers expect from our products and services and meet those expectations is what make customer have a great experiences with our products or services. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
5. Are effortless - One of the great pleasures we have is when we can accomplish what we want with a product or service with the minimum effort possible. Like Steve Krug’s book say, “Don’t make me think,” it very truth in Watkinson’s principle.(Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
6. Are stress free - Life is full of stress, such as the traffic conditions, million of choices to make everyday, lack of time, etc. The products and services that make our interaction stress free, smooth and easy, are in itself pleasant and the ones we enjoy interacting with.
7. Indulge the senses - Customer experiences which are pleasant to do and activate our senses in a good way are the ones we want to have more and more. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
8. Are socially engaging - word of mouth always work best than advertisement. That should tell us that when our social network accept and indulge a service or product, even if we don’t know it we are very likely to use it too. Keep good relationship with customers is always positive and should be done whenever possible. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).
9. Put the customer in control - Nobody likes to be forced to do anything. Put the customers in control on how, where and when they want to use our product or service is to provide a great user experience.
10. Consider the emotions - No matter what people say about the rationale of customer choices such as the ones based on price. If price wins is only because the product or service does not connect with your emotions in anyway. Nothing beat a delightful and enjoyable customer experience. When that happens we always come back for more whenever possible. (Should also be used for sales, brand awareness and marketing).

These are just a very basic summary of the what great customer experiences are all about.

People used to think User Experience can only be used on the technology field, for program architecture and designers, which is far from the truth. It can be used for sales, marketing, brand awareness, managing risks, testing, etc. The 10 points Watkinson describes in his book cover the entire aspects of user experience as a field and also gives a holistic view to let up to the reader decide what and where to use the information.

The beauty of User Experience as a field for me, is that we can pick the most important points that apply to our specific needs within our field of expertise and apply the knowledge to excel in whatever we do. Just keep I'm mind that as long as we have the User Experience principles to delight out customers in the top of our minds, all the rest will follow into place. That is a fact!