Archive for January, 2008
January 29th, 2008
I ended my last post by laying out four areas of customer experience management examples that my family and I were privy to at Disney World. Those areas were interaction, appearance, simplicity and customer. The best example I can offer to you for how much they believe in the experience of the customer radiates from the Bibbidy Boppity Boutique. Here, little girls are literally turned into a princess. The cast member that greets you lets you know that you will be working with your “fairy god mother” who then takes you to your seat and begins the transformation. In case you are wondering, the fairy god mother offers an array of services from a simple manicure to an extreme princess make over. My daughter got “princessed up,” as we came to call it. This included the nails, the hair, the make up, the shoes and the dress. The cast members referred to her as Princess Ava the entire time. When we left, they gave us an appointment card with her name on it, a free picture and all of the extra make up. You then walk out, through the biggest Disney store on the planet (oh yeah, the boutique is in a store. God forbid you don’t buy something while you are waiting.) Below is my daughter going through the transformation.
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January 25th, 2008
I had a couple of recent technological hiccoughs in my personal sphere. At the time, I passed them off as mere inconveniences — although I ranted quite loudly (warning, objectionable language) on one of them. But it was only when I stopped and took a step back that I wondered something:
Do I put too much faith in technology being there for me?
Which then led to some interesting questioning as I looked at the world around me. How much are we dependent on technology being there? It’s so pervasive now that most times we don’t even think about it.
At least not until it doesn’t respond.
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January 24th, 2008
Shop.org’s Annual Strategy and Innovation Forum is going on this week. The key theme of the conference is about Web 2.0 and it’s implications for retailing. Naturally social networking, community, Ajax, and rich experiences were all open game for discussion. But a simple question by one of the speakers got me to thinking…
One of the keynotes was Andy Sernovoitz. He’s one of the founders of WOMMA, a professor at Northwestern University, and the author of the book “Word of Mouth Marketing.” Andy took us through a number of great examples of Word-of-Mouth in action. But his most interesting slide was a post-it note with the question “Would Anybody Tell a Friend?” It’s a simple question. But one that could have profound impact on better products, and better marketing if we all heeded that question.
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January 23rd, 2008
The question isn’t if we’re heading into a recession. It’s how bad will it be—and what we learn from it? As marketing budgets feel the squeeze of the housing crisis and a slowing U.S. Economy, now is a good time to think about opportunities. That’s right. Opportunities. It just happens that the digital medium could be your best friend in a time when belts tighten. Here’s a few though starters for how digital can help your business or brand thrive in a recession:
1. Live by the rules of The Beta Economy
No other medium allows you to launch, test, relaunch, test, measure, tweak, re-tweak, evolve, relaunch, quite like the Web. Folks like Guy Kawasaki and Seth Godin preach about this all the time. Guy launched his Truemors service on a shoestring budget and uses Twitter to promote it. When budgets get cut—look to digital for new ways of testing out ideas vs. big bang and big budget initiatives (think Bud.TV)
2. Leverage Existing Platforms
Why build from scratch when you can use Wordpress as a CMS, Basecamp as a collaboration tool and Concept Share as a way to co-create. Now is a great time to dig into the already existing platforms (in addition to existing social networks). While building from scratch has its place, there are more options than ever to tap into a service that just might do the job.
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January 21st, 2008
I remember my reaction like it was yesterday. One of my friends was getting married, the first in my group of close friends to make that leap. We were at dinner one night and I asked him where he was going on his honeymoon. “We’re going to Disneyworld.” It caught me off guard. I actually thought he was joking. It was in the middle of the Disney marketing program where athletes who had just won the big game would look right into the camera and say the same thing. And for those of you in Chicago, remember the big stink about how Disney wanted MJ to do it by himself and he wouldn’t unless it was the whole starting five? So when they did it they were all sitting there and MJ said “We are ALL going to Disneyworld.” That’s sticking it to the man Mike! But I digress. Where was I? Oh yeah, the honeymoon. I asked him why and his answer was that his fiancé had grown up with Disney being part of her life and that she went back every year because it was always a great experience.
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January 15th, 2008
Okay, yes, I’m an Apple fanboy. I admit it. How can you not — the Good Ship Apple under the command of Rear Admiral Steve Jobs has done one hell of a good sell job since he stepped back into the company over a decade ago.
We need not go over the history of things that he’s done, but suffice to say Apple has become the darling of the computer industry.
Macworld is the annual drool-fest. What will Apple come up with next?
I’m writing this as the text spool from MacRumorsLive.com spins past on the other monitor. All I know so far is that I want a MacBook Air.
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January 11th, 2008
“Facebook has been incredibly successful in attracting huge numbers of members.” Not a terribly controversial statement.
“Facebook has been successful because they have delivered a powerful, engaging, robust Experience.” This statement is a bit much more controversial than the first as pundits and commentators can take issue with many aspects of the execution of the Facebook interface. But one can argue that given the huge adoption Facebook has experience, there is something about the Facebook Experience that is terribly compelling.
At it’s most basic level the Facebook experience is made up of a few key components…
- Simple, crisp design.
- Ability for each member to create their own “gated community”
- An Open Platform that allows 3rd parties to continuously provide new and interesting functionality to the members.
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January 10th, 2008
Last night over 50 members of Chicago’s IxDA (Interaction Design Association) converged at our Chicago office to discuss “the mobile experience”—it was a great event. Folks from places like Motorola, Orbitz and Arc Worldwide showed up. If you look through many of our 2008 predictions here, mobility has emerged as a key theme. We’re not the only ones taking this seriously—see what Adaptive Path’s Dan Harrelson has to say about the leaps and bounds he witnessed in the mobile user interface at this year’s CES.
If you’re interested in what we discussed, you can watch a video of the discussion here. Our topics meandered through the following themes:
-If we design websites for a living, will we ultimately need to become mobile designers as well?
-Impact of mobile data within retail spaces (ability to comparison shop in context, ability for the retail space to adjust itself based on who I am, mobile device as barcode scanning device, as coupon delivery system)
-Impact of mobile on the youth of today (so much time for them to text today, what happens when they enter the workforce?)
-Ethics of design in the mobile space
-Impact of mobile experiences on memory and cognition
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January 5th, 2008
While most marketers weren’t the first in line to try new marketing platforms in 2007, we’ll begin to see more brands involved in new channels next year. Consumer adoption and turn key solutions will drive marketers into new spaces.
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January 4th, 2008
“One word. Just one word. Plastics.” That was the line from the 1967 movie “The Graduate.” But in 2008, that one word is “Wireless.”
The shift to wireless is upon us and will only accelerate. It will take many forms, but you can bet that consumers will be thinking about it front and center. Their interest is about reducing complexity, increasing convenience, and having the information they want where they want it. I observed an interesting phenomenon in ‘07. And I think it’s a harbinger for ‘08 and beyond.
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