7 Responses to “What are the Elements of Customer Experience?”  

1. 1 Geoff Teehan Jun 14th, 2006 at 12:10 pm

   First I think we’d need to agree on a definition for “customer experience”. A recent Forrester report defined it as: “The degree to which customers feel that interactions meet their needs”. This goes way beyond the digital domain, so when you talk about “Marketing Platforms & Channels” you could get more specific and break it down into things like: Web, email, chat, in-store (retail), phone reps, kiosks, catalogs etc.

2. 2 scottweisbrod Jun 14th, 2006 at 12:28 pm

   Agreed. I’m definitely talking about platforms and channels beyond the digital domain. When I think of the total customer experience; I’m considering the tone and manner in which customer service reps deal with customers over the phone; if it’s a bank; how the teller talks with customer; what’s the ATM experience like? It’s pretty much endless.

3. 3 Karl Long Jun 14th, 2006 at 1:41 pm

   when I talk about the different “aspects” of customer experience I like to steal from Wally Olins, who is essentially a brand man, but he had a model for brand experience which I loved, which was this:

   Product
   Communication
   Environment
   Behavior

   I think the “behavior” aspect of this is what makes this work, becuse it accouts for “agents of experience” employee behavior, web site behavior etc. in other words the interactive parts of the experience. Anyway, I know it’s simplistic but it might form a useful top level taxonomy. I find it especially useful when thinking of service experience. I guess you can run into a few things that might fall into numorous categories, is opening the packing on the dyson cleaner part of the product, or behavior etc.

   Some other articles that talk about this are:
   http://blog.experiencecurve.com/archives/web-behaving-badly

   http://blog.experiencecurve.com/archives/brand-integrity-or-in-laymans-terms-dont-fuck-this-up

4. 4 James Thomson Jun 15th, 2006 at 2:33 am

   I’m confused - it’s almost like machine, platforms and companies are running and experiencing “the experience” - better to define first “the elements of customer experience” as you would to your grandma or small child (the best way to keep all this ludicrous jargon out of the conversation)

   I say the experience is wholly around the customer - what he or she sees, feels, hears, says and thinks with the think part the most powerful. You attend brand X’s company party and the experience is three fold - one what happens at the party, two how you think about it before and afterwards, and three how you the customer then talk about it afterwards. Lets leave company’s x’s product completely to one side.

   To me that is the core - and it is what goes on inside the customers head (think of emotive things like “the dream, sharing, a gift, desire, allure, anticipation, ideas, joy”) and then you have the basis surely for “the elements”

   You can build experience channels or platforms but this too easily detracts from what are the essential elements of experience.

   To be topical you can give the customer a football pitch but it is the playing on it that is the experience. Its what the customer takes out of it that forms the experience. Its not what the customer is given that matters, it what the customer creates himself.

   Are you perhaps talking about the elements of “controling” the customer experience. What the hell does a ‘marketing platform’ mean to a real person - nothing. Its corporate bullshit from some bizarre industrial age of mass branding

   James

5. 5 scottweisbrod Jun 16th, 2006 at 10:53 pm

   James - perhaps I should re-phrase, “the elements of customer experience” to ” the elements of customer experience and the tools that help deliver against it”. Sound good? You’re right when you say, “the experience is wholly around the customer “; it’s just that as marketers, creative thinkers, experience planners - however you classify yourself - we need to be thinking about the tools we have at our disposal to create a truly compelling, moving, and engaging customer experience.

   The channels and platforms are critical; they are the means by which a customer has an experience and influence the feeling created in their minds and hearts about the company; the brand.

   Karl; thanks for your contributions to the elements (Product, Communication, Environment, Behavior). This is all leading up to something; if you get the spark first; spread the word!

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