Article

Shaping the customer experience with digital signage

The goal is two-fold: accomplish the task at hand, and make the customer feel good about how it was accomplished.

November 29, 2011 by James Bickers

The following is the introduction to "Shaping the customer experience with digital signage," which can be downloaded in its entirety here.

Good experiences linger in the mind for days, weeks and sometimes even months. Bad experiences can linger for a lifetime. If someone were asked about the last time he had terrible service in a restaurant, he wouldn't have to think about it for very long. But if asked about the last time he had extraordinary service in a restaurant ... well, that would take a little longer.

The psychology of the customer experience says that when things are bad, it's noticed right away, but when things are good, they often go unnoticed, simply because that's the expectation. The waiter was pleasant. The store was well stocked. The new car drove like a dream.

Well, why should these things be noticed — isn't that what they're supposed to do?

For those in the business of providing great customer experiences, this is an opportunity. There is a concept in sales that it doesn't matter what is done for clients; what matters is what is done for them that they realize.

This may sound cynical on the surface, but dig deeper and it becomes clear that it is not. Business is complex, far too complex to rely on the once-innocent assumption that customers will take notice of the good things done for them.

The days of the attentive mother sending a "thank-you" card to the people at Sears & Roebuck for shipping her daughter's new school clothes on time are, sadly, long gone. People expect not only that retailers will do for them what they say they will, but that retailers will do more, because customers deserve it.

When it comes to planning a customer experience using technology, the goal is two-fold: accomplish the task at hand, and make the customer feel good about how it was accomplished. Perhaps the task is to speed up a transaction; perhaps it is to solve a problem; or perhaps it is just to give the customer a great time. No matter the reason for the technology, it is not enough to meet the goal — the customer has to know the way in which the goal was accomplished, to make them feel a part of the process and make them glad they took part.