Process + Brand = Experience

Pulled pork, anyone? Why an informercial for a pressure cooker is so effective.

I was watching an infomercial for the PowerPressure Cooker while I was on the elipitcal the other day. I couldn’t find the remote at the gym to change the channel and got busy working out, so I started watching. I didn’t have the audio, but it didn't matter. The subtitles were on the screen and I was a captive audience for 30 minutes as I was eliptical-ing. 

 

 

 

Believe it or not, after about 15 minutes of watching the infomercial, I felt like I wanted to buy one. 

 

I didn’t need one. I don’t even use pressure cookers, really. So why did I feel the need to get it?

 

It was the customer relationship lifecycle.

 

 

 

Believe it or not, infomercials use tactics that follow the lifecycle during the ad, guiding you to understand the problems you have, present a solution, and encourage you to buy. 

 

How does it work?

 

The video opens by showing a family dinner. It’s something we all like and want to do more often. However if you have ever cooked such a dinner, you know that it can be overwhelming to prepare. The cutting, the chopping, the preparing, the steps to cook each item. And you want cleanup to be easy. The infomercial shows a bunch of cooking disasters - burned pasta, destroyed pans. I thought it was over the top (how many things can you burn?), but it made its point.

 

Cooking isn't always easy.

 

Then they host a chef to demonstrate all of the possible meals you can make using only this pressure cooker - from turkey to chicken to cornish game hens to rice to ribs to chili to wings and more. They show how many purposes it has. It’s pretty amazing! You can even make cornbread and an apple coffeecake with it. 

 

By taking you through the pre-purchase and the purchase decision steps, and by providing some information from post-purchase, if you didn’t think you needed this Pressure Cooker, you will by the end of the 30 minute show. 

 

How they address Pre-Purchase: 

• They define a problem you may have, and figure you'll probably relate to one of these:
  • Your need to make a famiy dinner with easy preparation and cleanup.
  • Your fear of not making certain dishes as good as you could (like rice, pulled pork, turkey). 
  • You find cooking difficult.
  • You think cooking takes too much time.
  • You want to eat healthier, more flavorful food.
  • If you don’t have any of those problems, then you may have a cleaning problem after cooking you’d like to solve or reduce.
• They describe and showcase what the product is and what it generally does.
• They also explain what pressure cooking is, it's benefits, and why you'd want to do it.
  • They explain the health reasons why pressure cooking is a better approach.
  • There is an explanation of the theory behind pressure cooking and how it works.

 

How they address the Purchase Decision

• They provide a solution to the problems outlined above. 
  • Some of the solutions are simply to use the product. 
  • They show how easy it is to cook almost anything.
  • They show how it's easy to make healthy, more flavorful food
  • They demonstrate how easy it is to clean, how it works for cooking. 
• Demonstrate how to use the product.
  • Because it’s a video, they can’t give a demo or have it available ot use in a showroom, so they cook with it. Sure, it’s a time elapsed cooking show only displaying the end products. But you get enough of an idea in the time elapsed story to understand how it works and what it can do. 
  • You fully understand the solution and its capabilities.
• They provide a sense of its size for you by placing containers for canning in it, demonstrating how much it can hold in comparison with other presure cookers.
• They compare the pressure cooker with rice cookers and other similar equipment onscreen. 
  • It's not an in-depth comparison. In the video, they demonstrate enough of a difference to show why the pressure cooker is a better choice/option.
• They don’t use customer stories because they have a chef onscreen doing a demo. In a way, that’s a customer story on it’s own.

 

Post-purchase

• They demonstrate how to clean it, maintain it, and how to store it.
• They post the price with directions how to buy it and own it.
• They mention the guarantee to show that buying it isn't a huge financial risk.
• They provide instructions and cookbooks to help you get started making these great dishes.

 

Yes, the infomercial touches on almost every section of the customer relationship journey except the product experience because you need to own the product for that. I think that’s why it’s so effective. 

 

You understand what you are getting into with your purchase, what problems you'd solve, what the solution would provide, and how it would benefit you. You could see what it would mean to own the product and how it would contribute to your life. There's no risk, it saves you time. At the end of the ad you understand what the product is and how it compares to other solutions. It's easy to make up your mind.

 

Oh yes, and the emotional connection is around food and making meals for your family. If you are challenged cooking and feel bad that you aren't a great cook, this will help. If you are in the pursuit of healthy cooking, this will help. It solves many fears.

 

After hearing how it’s 4 installments of $33, I’m still tempted to get one. I have nothing to lose. Pulled pork, anyone?

 

Communications is the future of UX

I've been noticing a convergence of social media, content strategy, and UX with the rise of mobile, IoT, and AI. 

The days of having a conversation with your computer is near! I honestly can't wait for it. I think it's going to be super exciting to observe the developments over the next few years. 

I decided to attend a blended executive masters program to get ready for this switch to content being emperor. 

Here's the article over at LinkedIn. Curious to hear your thoughts! 

Bad business impacts everyone. A tale about a rental car.

I traveled to San Francisco International Airport for work. I needed to make my way to Mountain View to sleep that night and then Sunnyvale for meetings the next morning. It should have been a fairly straightforward trip, but when I heard that my flight was delayed, I knew that I was in for an adventure. I guess United's computer system was down that day, causing a number of re-routing problems, from passengers to planes.

It all started with my flight being delayed by 30 minutes, which is nothing in the world of travel. That can be made up in a flight. The real delay occurred when we started to land at SFO but the pilots abandoned the landing at the last minute because of the weather conditions. 

The weather was just a mess.

I finally made it to the car rental building to pickup the car by 10:15pm. I originally booked the reservation to pickup the car at 8pm. Yes, we're talking a 2 hour delay at this point. 

I made it to Car Rental Company A (or rather, FOX Rental Car) counter, where there were about 6 people in line before me. I figured it wouldn't be long now. 

45 minutes later, I finally got to talk to an agent. At this point, rather than 2 agents working there was only 1. I guess the other one was on his meal break? I gave the agent my info - my name, my license - and she went to find my reservation. A few seconds later she told me that my reservation was cancelled because the system automatically cancels car reservations after 3 hours.

Yes, cancelled. Through no fault of my own, my car reservation was cancelled.

What made it worse was that my reservation wasn't just cancelled, I was told to pay $25 extra per day for it. Yes - my booked rate was gone, I already had to wait an additional hour in line causing my reservation to be cancelled, and I'd have to pay more money to get a car. They had to be kidding! 

I decided to take my chances elsewhere.

I went to the Car Rental Company B (Budget) counter to see what they would charge for what I wanted to do. A lovely woman there immediately helped me get a price. Actually, it wasn't too much more money. In fact, the daily charge was about the same. I was on my way in 20 minutes.

I also learned that Car Rental Company A has done this before, especially for international travelers who don't know any different about American car rental companies. 

The next day, I sent an email to the woman's manager to tell them how much I appreciated her kindness and service. She really helped me out and got me on my way.

I got a response.

Sure, they appreciated getting feedback on the woman at the counter. She's a rockstar.

But apparently, I wasn't the only person having a problem with Car Rental Company A. Car Rental Company B is often cleaning up the problems that A creates. It's becoming a pattern. The customer satisfaction manager contacted me to better understand my problem with Car Rental Company A because it was impacting B's business. Sure, they love the business that A inadvertently sends their way, but people are coming to B on the furious side. It's not fair to any customer nor to Company B. They were repairing the broken relationships A caused.

You could say that A was doing all of these rental car companies a favor. But were they?

• They ruined the travel experience for some at SFO.
• They made their competitors clean up their mess. 
• They are giving rental car companies a bad name - sketchy, sly, and an industry that takes advantage of a customer's situation. Just not helpful.

 

So what are the morals of this story?

• When you have a complaint about a company, share it. Others probably have a similar complaint. You are never alone when you experience a problem with a company. There are probably 5 or 6 more people having experiences like yours, waiting to voice their challenges.

• Not all companies want to make a fast buck. Some genuinely want to help customers. And not just their own customers - any customers. I think some companies truly like helping people find solutions to their problems. Thank God for those companies!

• Complaining to a competitor isn't being gossipy. There may actually be a larger problem there. In this case, Company A was providing a sketchy experience to customers. This wasn't just impacting their own business and improving business for competitors, it was impacting the experience people were having with the airport. This is why the competitors were getting annoyed. They were getting unhappy customers looking for solutions at their counters. Sure, they got the business. But at the same time, they got challenging customers who were annoyed and they had to fix a competitor's problem. That can win customers, but it can also cost a company money.

• Just because someone doesn't share a complaint with you doesn't mean you did a great job. Most people won't complain about terrible service. See the first bullet. Often people don't complain.

• Always complement those who help you. They deserve the praise. They made your day - make theirs. Or help make their year if this goes on their record and contributes towards a bonus.

• If you are a company that's part of a larger ecosystem, remember that your challenging business practices don't simply impact you; they impact the perception people have of your competitors or the experience in that ecosystem. It's like a stone in a shoe. It hurts. It's annoying. And a small stone ruins how you experience wearing that shoe. And you may need to replace the shoe over a stone. Don't be that stone. 

The Continuum from Pity to Compassion

In order to understand how to design games that include experiences that will help people to feel empathy (Empathy Exercises), I need to be able to understand the range of feeling from pity to compassion.

 

Here is a chart I came up with that outlines the similarities and differences. It is a draft - so any feedback is welcome.

 

Rather than repeat the phrases "people feeling emotion" and "people experiencing problems/challenges" throughout the chart, I decided to refer to them as:

• Person A (people feeling emotion)
• Person B (people experiencing problems/challenges). 

 

 

With Empathy Exercises, this chart raises the question, how do you bring someone from pity to at least empathy? 

 

To start to answer that, let’s start with why it is difficult, if not impossible, to create or market a product when you are feeling pity for prospects or customers. There are two main reasons:

• You can’t relate to your prospects’ or customers' problems
• You don’t think they can solve the problems they have

If you can’t relate to your prospects or customers problems, then you will never understand what they are experiencing. This is where the games in Empathy Exercises can help change that perception (and I have a post about this for tomorrow/Wednesday).

What does it mean to understand what someone else is going through and walk in their shoes? 

Here’s an example. Lets say two people just met in a doctor’s waiting room. One is waiting to hear about the results from his series of blood tests for AIDs. The other is waiting to hear about the results of his biopsy for Stage 4 lung cancer. Both have very different ailments. Both have very different lives. However, the connecting experience is that they both have life thretening ailments and are waiting to hear about their results. Both are most likely feeling similar anxiety to hear about their health conditions, although they are different. 

 

This is what is meant by walking in someone else’s shoes. It may not be an exact situation, but it is about the similarities of the situation. In this case, both are in the situation of waiting to hear news about their lives and what’s next.

 

The second reason is more problematic and harder to solve. If you don’t think your prospects or customers can solve their problem, then you have a respect problem. And the only way to repair a respect problem is through you and your perspective of your customers and prospects. No one can make you respect anyone else; that is a choice. Often the way to improve respect between people is to start treating them with respect with the hope that grows.

Keep in mind, if you don't respect someone, that doesn't mean the other person does not respect you. In fact, the other person may hold you in high regard. 

Empathy Exercies may help here because it is possible that if you can relate to someone's problems, respect may grow out of that. It may be a way to build respect through understanding, but there is no guarantee. There may be deeper issues at hand to cause the lack of spect. 

Now, if you fix these problems, you may still have a challenge with your customer and why they won’t buy your product: they don’t recognize that they have a problem. That’s a different type of problem. That means either:

• You aren’t clearly communicating what you do
• The prospect/customer simply doesn't relate to having the problem you solve
• The prospect/customer doesn't see his problem as necessary to fix

In some way, you aren't relating to your prospect or customer so he understands what you do. Again, this is where Empathy Exercises could help you better relate to your customer and inform them of your product and services.

The bottom line: to connect with prospcts and customers you cannot feel pity. Great products are created when you feel empathy for your customers and prospects and want to help them fix their problem. Great marketing happens when you feel compassion and want to solve problems with your prospects and customers and include them in the process. More on that soon.

We live in a world of conversations - Part 1. Is it a conversation - or really a transaction?

Have you noticed how often people are walking around, staring at their phones? I think we’ve all witnessed people stumbling, walking into doors and the like while holding - and staring at - their phones. Or we’ve witnessed people glancing at and interacting with their phones at dinner with their companions each doing the same. 

 

 

Although what these people are doing could be considered rude, each of these people are having some type of conversation with another through their phone.

 

Sadly, they are forgetting that you don’t need to have a phone to have a conversation. 

 

Conversations have a simpler origin that requires no devices - only language and listening between at least two people.

 

 

What is a conversation?

We have a number of ways to start a conversation with people today - all of these valid communication methods (listed from most interactive to least, according to my perspective):

• In-person discussion
• Video chat
• Telephone
• Letters (paper letters through the mail)
• Social media
• Texting
• Email
• Blogs
• Web
• Fax (no one uses it really, but it is an option)
• Books and magazines

I'm sure I'm missing a few items here, but you get the idea.

 

I think as conversations move from person-to-person interactions (in-person, phone, video) towards a more abstracted means of written and electronic communications (email, texting, social media), there is less of a volley between at least two people discussing ideas and more of a push of ideas and information from a single person to others to provide immediate feedback. Almost like a transaction - someone receives information from someone else and does something with it.

 

What do I mean by volley? Not just two people talking, back and forth. I mean a volley where people talk, take a pause, collect their thoughts to respond, and listen. That is what makes an engaging conversation.

 

 

Listening is a key aspect of any conversation - and required if you want to keep it interesting and engaging.

 

We know if we are engaging when we talk to someone in person, and we can somewhat determine that through phone and Webcam/Video chat conversations. But it is only in person where you get immediate feedback that what you are saying is resonating with the other person, that he or she understands you, that the person has feedback or input for you, that the person wants to contribute to the conversation. 

 

(Note: Julian Treasure does a lot of work on listening and how to improve your listening skills. He has done about 5 TED talks on the subject. A favorite is 5 Ways to Listen Better.)

 

And listening happens not only by hearing words and understanding what is said, but watching people’s physical reactions - their facial expressions, their body language. We can sense if someone agrees, disagrees, or has a different perspective. There could be nods, head shaking, smiles, frowns, or smirks. And we can ask for their opinion if they are silent with no expression.

 

In written and electronic communications, we’ll push out thoughts and ideas and hope that someone reads them and provide their reactions. Most won’t, whether they agree or disagree, unless you write something extremely controversial. Or you send an individual an email, where he or she feels that he should respond in some way.

 

Over social media and through blogs or Web sites, we build relationships with people who like or repost what we say. They complete an action to let us know they agree. It’s a relationship built through agreement. People like a post. Or they subscribe to a newsletter. And the social media engines leverage algorithms that learn this and link us closer together.

 

But such social media posts promote one-way conversation. Which raises the question: are these really relationships? Or are they groups of like-minded people who agree with each other? 

 

Two-way conversations allow people to share ideas and information; they can include disagreements and hopefully, changed perceptions. But what makes conversations interesting is that they allow people to grow personally. Listening gives you the opportunity to see the world through someone else's eyes for a second, possibly experience a little empathy, and change your own perspective of the world. The ability to share your ideas allow you to change others’ perspectives as well.

 

It’s a beautiful thing.

 

What happens with companies and conversations?

Companies often create content to satisfy content marketing programs, but these questions need to be asked:

• Are these companies having a conversation with readers?
• What are people doing with the content they create?
• Do people care about this content? Do they want to continue a conversation about it? 

Companies will often create a form to collect contact information and place it before “important” content that they think people will find interesting. They post the package on the Web, promote it through SEM, email marketing, social media and all the usual suspects. They will also distribute the content to sales and hope they send it around as well.

 

In other fronts, companies will create apps that allow users to complete tasks that would normally require a phone call or conversation to complete. For example, someone could place an order, find an address, get a phone number, pay a bill, write a letter through an app without contacting a single person. Basically, the person completes a transaction that would have required a conversation in the past.

 

But when we do these things, are we encouraging or preventing conversations? Or are we engaging in transactions - from our content marketing programs to our apps. Do this - then that happens.

 

We only know what people think about us and our content based on the stats we get from these transactions. We know how many comments we get, or likes, or follows, or reposts. We can view data about how many people download a PDF or view a blog page. But as stated earlier, in social media, even companies can end up forming “tribes” of followers who think similarly as they do.

 

In apps, how people use the apps gives us insights into which functionality is most effective (however we define that), which functionality works as planned, which functionality is not used often or users end up with many errors using it. 

 

But again, these have nothing to do with conversations. These are transactions. And transactions are meant to get us into agreement about factual things. Do this - then that. 

 

A conversation requires much more than that.

Now for Part 2: We live in a world of conversations - Part 2. We automated lead gen, but did that make a business relationship a transaction? Let's reverse that.

Working with a virtual team can teach UX and CX professionals empathy, how to tell a good story, and how to listen. Part 2.

Read Part 1 about what it means to have empathy working on a virtual team...

 

Writers are master storytellers and understand how to share information to a virtual audience

Writers create art that isn't experienced live at creation. They express an idea in words for someone to read not only at a different time, but a different place and for a wide audience. Writers try to be sure they are communicating clearly. Some will have others read their work to make sure it makes sense. They target writing for a specific audience knowing that just about anyone will read the piece, so in some ways, there is a balance of creating something for someone who needs to read it versus who does happen to come across it and read it.

Writers will often structure a piece to share a story in a linear step by step sequence. Or share a story in a more circular way. Either way, the goal of any piece is to get someone to picture a scene, process, future vision - anything idea, concept or scene - in his or her mind. A writer creates an experience for the imagination. It's a type of experience that doesn't happen in person, but it is highly personal and individual.

Ironically, the defined experience on the page is broad enough to accommodate many; specific enough for a reader to create his own experience in his head.

The takeaway:

As a UX or CX professional, consider how writers tell a story to someone who they don't know, who can't ask additional questions, and doesn't care about some details (but know that there are details that are necessary to tell the story properly)?

And you need to tell a story that your target audience will understand - as will people who happen to stumble upon your piece.

That's the type of framework any online experience should take. Try to do the same with an experience you construct.

 

Working Remotely helps you Listen better. Listening is key to empathy.

Listening is awesome. It is hard to do, but it is something I enjoy doing. It helps me learn more about other people, their motivations, their interests, what makes them work. I think it is a core skill that's needed in the world. If more people listened to each other, fewer virtual teams would fail and more people would work well together.  

Justin Treasure talks about listening often. He's one of my heroes because he is so spot on about it. Here's a diagram I stole from one of his lectures about what we learn in school. Listening is often on not on the list.

 

So how does one listen? There are two guidelines I follow: 

1. Listen to understand, not respond.
2. Consider listening a prime time activity. It is not something you can multi-task and do in the background, like listening to the radio.
3. Listening is key to a conversation. Conversations are about give and take. If you keep talking, you keep giving. You have to take sometimes too.

How many of us have been caught in that trap?  You are on a call, you discuss something, and then you find out that the other person isn't listening - says something and later on you act like no one ever talked about it.

Or you listen with judgement in your mind about what is being discussed, subconsciously allowing yourself to hear what you want to hear from that person. You may miss what the person was trying to share with you. And you may miss an opportunity to interact with that person.

Listening, if done well, gives you insight into other people's perspectives and empathy for others. You can hear the tone of someone's voice. You can hear if someone is distracted. What someone is talking about tells you what is on his or her mind. You hear what is being said as well as what is NOT being said.

You take what someone allowed you to know and get as much meaning out of it as you can. Listening is what really builds relationships. It is not the talking or sharing. It is understanding all of the possible motivations for someone, all of the possibilities where he or she could be coming from.

Listening allows someone to share their perspective with you, build trust, and build a relationship. 

This is a skillset vital for UX and CX professionals. 

• Usability testing requires listening skills. You need to read between the lines of what is discussed and shared and what isn't. Sometimes it is what the user isn't seeing that is the gap for massive product improvements.

• Ask questions about what isn't being said. Knowing what isn't being said only happens when you are listening to the other person.

• Listen without judgements. You may want to confirm a particular result from a usability review or test, but if that expected and desired outcome isn't occurring, you need the objectivity to realize that maybe a different solution is necessary. Take what they say at face value.

• If you can't listen to real people - use data. Read between the lines to determine what the data tells you - and what it doesn't tell you. Listening to people closely teaches you how to read between the lines, and it is a skillset that helps you in so many other areas. Especially when analyzing data. - and I think this is key for most UX/CX professionals to be able to do.

• Stop talking all the time, listen, and have a conversation. Most content is about talking, or giving - it's going on and on about a topic. Stop. Start a dialogue or discussion. Conversations and the experience of a conversation are what drive relationships. And an interaction online is a conversation.

 

So how do you use all of this information?

How can you use the experience of working with a virtual team, listening and understanding how writers work? 

• When creating an experience, help your audience visualize what you are trying to accomplish. When you work with a virtual team and you need to explain an idea, you tell a story and try to help the team envision a process or an idea. An experience should be like a story.

• Build a relationship with your audience by sharing a story - or rather, an experience. You don't know them, and probably never will. But a story, or rather experience, will help them understand you better. 

• Make sure your experience is specific enough for users to have an individualized experience, but general enough for many people to want to have that experience. Be like a writer - target one group but make sure that others can experience it too.

• Use your data as a "listening" tool to learn more about your audience and how to best work with them. Know that it is ok not to fully understand all of the motivations for them.

• Know that not everyone will share all of their insights and perspectives with you - so listen to what's being said and not said. Sometimes, what's not being said is more important.

• This wasn't really covered much, but people don't read. This is a large part of my presentation on virtual teams - and it drives my advice to create more audio, video and other types of content. Stop with the ebooks and Web pages already! People are knowledge collectors. If someone wants more information, they will let you know and have a conversation.

• Stop talking and start having a conversation. Conversations are the best experiences because they are about sharing. And that's key to knowing what it means to listen and be on a virtual team. Give and take. Make sure your site has more of those experiences - it keeps people engaged.

 

If it is possible, I think UX and CX professionals should work virtually so that they can understand what it means to be a user. It is hard to be isolated, only interacting with a company through a Web site or phone. This is why it is so important to learn how to listen and how to have a conversation. Examine how writers achieve story telling and how they pull people into experiences. And remember - people share what they want to share. You don't know the full story. You need to listen carefully to get that. 

Working with a virtual team can teach UX and CX professionals empathy, how to tell a good story, and how to listen. Part 1.

I have been working with virtual teams for about 20 years. There have been variable levels of virtual-ness to them. In some cases, I worked with colleagues in Europe or Asia actively on a project. In other cases, people were working on the same project in different cities. In yet other cases, we were all individual contributors working from our desks at home. 

There were timezone differences, location differences, cultural differences.

In all cases, I would be working with people I saw once a year, if that. I mostly interacted with people on the phone, chat/instant message, or email. 

I have given a presentation a number of times now about how to work with virtual teams as a UX professional using Agile methodologies. I never directly saw the connection between understanding what it means to work virtually and how that applies to user experience and customer experience. But there is a connection. And that connection is probably why I keep working on virtual projects.

 

What you get out of working virtually when you are a UX/CX professional.

Or - working virtually teaches you empathy when you don't know the full story.

When you work virtually, you don't get to see what the person at the next desk is working on today. You have no idea what's truly happening in an office - literally and figuratively. If there are rumors brewing and secret discussions happening, you simply don't know about them. You only know what you see and experience, which isn't much, especially if you work from home or in a different office. You are removed from the team and the in-office experience.

It is hard to ask someone questions and interact directly because you aren't sure what their focus is for the day or what they need to do. There are many unknowns about a virtual team member's life.

You only see what people allow you to see. 

You don't know the emotional state of your colleagues, unless they tell you. For all you know, that person acting cold and aloof on the phone could be having a rough day and trying to keep it to him or herself. You can't see if that person is in distress, happy, nervous, sad, or any other emotion. People share what they want to share with you on the phone, on chat, or in email. People don't always share good or bad news, for whatever reason. And you will never know the motivation to share or not share and it shouldn't matter. 

Yes - I said it. Motivations don't matter.

In the end, you need to connect with that person, regardless of his or her feelings and emotions, and get work done. You need to operate with compassion, knowing that someone may be hiding - intentionally or unintentionally - his or her feelings about a topic. And those hidden feelings hide that individual's true motivations. When you work remotely, you need to be able to consider multiple motivations for someone's actions because you simply don't know what is driving them. 

And again - you aren't there to know. Your job is to listen to that person and try to understand what he or she is experiencing at that moment.

Although this makes building relationships online difficult, understanding people, their emotions, and motivations from afar is a skillset that is amazingly useful for UX and CX professionals to have.

We create experiences for people who aren't in front of us to ask us questions. We don't always know what users are feeling during an experience. We don't know everyone's motivation for going to a site or app to complete a task. We like to think we know how they are responding to content or design during an experience, but we don't. Sure, personas and ethnographic research informs us, but we honestly don't know the motivations for each individual. UX and CX professionals only understand experiences through clicks or the scroll of a screen, call records, or other data. We know people through stats. In a usability study, we can ask questions, but we are only hearing what these participants tell us, only seeing the facial expressions they are sharing, only seeing what they are clicking.

Like the virtual world, we need to keep in mind that we are getting information that a user is allowing us to see. Or information that we are able to gather. We don't always have the full picture.

Most times, users won't share what their challenges are with a site or product. We will need to explore the issue with more people to get a better understanding. Most times, users will go to a site and do what they need to do. Some users "make do" with an experience. Some complain and send emails or messages. But most just try to make a solution work.

 

What does it mean to communicate to someone who is pretty much anonymous?

How do we make an experience as easy as possible for someone who is right in front of you, but you don't know? And all we know about this person is how he or she is providing feedback about an experience through clicks.

It is similar to working with a virtual team. You probably don't know much about that person except what his or her job is. But you need to find a way to work with that person and get something done.

This is why I think it's key for UX and CX people to work remotely. It helps you realize:

• What it means to know someone but not know them - and to know that it doesn't always matter. We have personas and research. We understand a handful of possible motivations they may have to complete tasks, but we don't know the details of their life. Nor should we. Nor do we need to. You can still build a great relationship with someone without that information. You need to have a working relationship with the user and need to define what that means.

• What it means NOT to be part of a live and in-person experience. Users experience completing a task through what's on the screen. They don't know or understand what happens inside a company - nor should they. It's almost like working remotely. You know what happens at the company based on what you are exposed to through the phone, Web sites, emails...not what you are missing or you simply don't know.

• What it means to interact with ONLY a screen and have no other way to know who you are dealing with. That's how most customers interact with you - a screen. Or through articles that they read. Or through a phone call. Or through a chat window. These customers have a limited view into a company and that is ok. It's not necessary and it can still be successful.

• What it means to have a working relationship with someone. What do you need to know about someone to get your job done - and vice versa? Frankly, not much. You need to know some basics about the person, but knowing someone personally is a great feature. It's not necessary. When you design for people, you don't need to know the details - and these users probably won't tell you anyway in their actions with through data or other means.

Some things to keep in mind when you design knowing the virtual team experience:

• What knowledge do you as a designer or developer take for granted about the user?
• What are all of the possible motivations of someone coming to your site or app? 
• What would you like someone to be feeling when they use your product or visit your site? 
• What do you take for granted that a user may know about the process your company puts online?
• What do you think the users assume about your business? Are there myths to correct?
• How are new features or products communicated to users?
• What is really industry jargon vs. a word to use? Does your audience use jargon? Do you care if people outside your target don't understand what you are saying?
• What does it mean to be an outsider (new customer, prospect, outside the industry)? How can this outsider be welcomed into the fold? 

 

What can writers teach UX/CX professionals and listening in Part 2. Stay tuned!

 

The customer has a pleasant experience: peak-end rule, expectations, and goals

This is #7 of 9 Characteristics of Great Customer Experiences. Read the entire list!

What does it t mean to have a pleasant experience with a company - online or offline. Pleasant experiences are very memorable - and there is a reason for that. Part of it involves the peak-end rule (one of my favorite psychology insights). 

I wrote about this rule in another blog post: Why do memorable experiences happen during support calls? Here is a excerpt of the definition:

I learned about peak-end rule at the Giant UX Conference in South Carolina. I attended a presentation by Curt Arledge titled: User Memory Design: You Can’t Take Experiences With You.

The peak-end rule claims people remember the most extreme and the ending of an experience. Most aspects of an experience aren't particularly memorable; it's rare to experience something extreme. Typically, extreme experiences center around problems and challenges; we often don't associate extreme experiences around something positive, unless it is extreme winnings or a prize of some sort. 

But there is a catch to this when it comes to enjoyable experiences: one needs to consider the expectations a user has going into an experience. If the expectation is met and the ending is successful, then the user will remember a success. If the expectation is NOT met, then the memory of the event will be unpleasant and the user will remember that it was a failure. 

 

Usability Tests with Prototypes: Wireframes vs Designed Screens

There is often a debate around usability tests and if it makes more sense to test with a final, designed product or to test early and often during the process, starting with wireframes, or even sketches. 

In keeping with Agile methodologies, I prefer to test interfaces early and often, especially using sketches. The main reason: users don't really like interacting with a sketch. That sounds odd, doesn't it? Well, look at it this way - if a user likes the interaction described on a sketch, imagine what he will feel like when the screen is fully designed?

Most users are familiar with designed screens with colors. They aren't used to looking at a black and white and grey screen. Users looking at a blank-ish screen don't have the ability to choose a button because it is the right color as defined by the branded screen environment. Or have the ability to select something because it is pretty.

On a black and white screen, a user chooses items because they make sense to select. Or they read the copy because they can - there isn't much else to distract them, like cool icons or other design novelties. Testing with a wireframe or black and white screen helps you - and users - identify what is important to them in the process as well as where they get lost, and where there needs to be more assistance.

There were times, though, after testing wireframes I'd wonder: if they like this unfinished screen, what would they think about something more finished? More designed?

In fact, presenting a well-designed, visually appealing screen will, but it's nature, support the underlying interaction design and almost MAKE IT WORK. This happens whether the interaction design is solid or just flawed thinking. I saw this happen time and time again. A user would be told to complete a task on a visually appealing, beautiful screen that frankly, didn't make much sense, but the users would accept the flawed screen as a great solution. Sure, a visually appealing screen implies that the design is done and users then decide that they will just accept it as the way it is.

People will rationalize physical beauty as being the same as being functional. They will forgive the challenges of the UI because it is attractive. They may be searching for functionality, not understanding the interface, but they make it work in their own minds because it is attractive. And attractive things must work well, right?

 

How peak-end rule applies

The extreme experience in a usability study can occur when a participant is very confused or pleased with the outcome. I think in the case of the black and white screens or sketches, a user is pleased when he walks away from that type of experience and realized he could complete a task. That's a great sense of accomplishment! Especially since the screen looked meh and it still worked...

Conversely, if he fails, something similar happens but in the other end of the emotional scale. If the participant didn't feel like he was able to complete any tasks, there is a slight feeling of failure (why it is so important to tell participants that success or failure are both right answers). But the failure isn't all that bad because the screen was meh, so the anticipated experience was meh to start.

When a user sees a beautiful screen, already his expectations are set higher. He will remember the beauty of the screen; he won't remember how he didn't understand how to complete tasks. However, this won't impact his experience as much because the high point of the experience - the most extreme point - was seeing the pretty screen. If the user can't complete tasks that's not an extreme event (unless it is ongoing and the user gets frustrated) - he was already rewarded with a pretty screen and won't remember the problems. 

That's why a great UI really does matter.

 

Finding bargains and curiosities in a disorganized store can be a great experience

I remember going to Building #19 as a kid. The charm of the store was the bargains you could find in it. It was pretty incredible to learn what was on sale because a warehouse was on fire and items in it had fire damange or something like that. But the challenge of the store was that it really wasn't the prettiest around. In fact, it was kinda grungy. I don't think it even had a real floor to speak of; it was concrete with tiles here and there. The staff didn't clean it often. But they had great deals - that's why people went there. And you went to rummage - as these videos illustrate.

 

 

How peak-end rule applied

In the experience of Building #19, you remembered the deal (or steal) you got. And you remember the fun you had looking at random stuff everywhere. An extreme emotional experience could come from the hilarity of finding a toilet in the middle of the store. Or extreme disgust at finding something so old and rotten it should be discarded. Or disgust at finding something so old it needs dusting (like a pattina of dust!). Or a deal on a rug that was from Building #19 that was so incredible because there were a few random threads out of place that someone at the store had to show you.

Finding the bargain was always the pleasant customer experience. Secondly, the experience was fun because you could rummage thru random stuff and have an interesting life experience. 

 

Phone calls about unpleasant subjects with nice people

I've been on calls about unpleasant subjects like billing. There was one call sequence with AmEx where the person calling insulted me, accusing me of not wanting to pay my bill (yes, I reported him and cancelled cards and never had the same perspective of American Express again. Talk about peak-end rule for a bad experience!).

When I think about banks and good experiences, I fondly recall my experiences with Citibank - especially when they helped fix an ongoing issue I had with an auto-payment. To sum it up: I made an early payment for a loan, but an autopay option kicked in shortly after that payment so I paid twice. The system didn't realize it and I was in an infinite loop of payment and cancellations.

Sure, I complained through social media to get their attention. However, I went into the experience with extremely low expectations. I was already highly annoyed at the fact that they couldn't fix this circular problem that their systems created and that humans found insane. I was also annoyed that I needed to keep calling them to get any attention whatsoever.

 

How does peak-end rule apply

I was so upset with Citibank and it's automated processes that made no sense that my expectations for any type of experience were low. I wanted a single result: resolution of the circular billing problem.

When someone helped me and resolved the issue in a day - I was thrilled! And the person who helped me being nice was such an added bonus. On top of that, the end result was a successful resolution. Between my low expectations and being able to achieve my goal, of course I had a great experience!

 

What does this all mean?

Pleasant experiences don't always include carefully designed stores that are highly maintained. A pleasant experience is about satisfying a customer's need and expectation. Either the customer is able to complete a task he couldn't complete previously or he is able to find a tremendous deal or he has successful resolution. 

Sure, it helps to have a great experience when staff is neat looking and polite. However, the pleasant experience is a result of the peak-end rule combined with user expectations of what the experience should be and his goal for that experience. The success or failure of the experience happens during extreme events or meeting expectations and goals. If the goals and expectations are met, that's great! If the experience and goals exceeds expectations - even better!

You lose if the expectations and goals aren't met at all.

 

When creating a pleasant experience, consider:

• What does the user want to do? What are his goals when he comes to your site, uses your product, or goes to your store? What will make him happy?
• What are his expectations when he comes to your site, uses your product, or goes to your store?
• What would make an experience considered to be a failure for the user?
• What can I do to ensure that the failure experience won't happen? How can I make a successful experience all the time?
• What's needed to have a peak experience for the user? Should I incorporate a peak experience?

 

 

2016 Predictions for UX - Always fun to read!

It's always fun to read what people see in the future! Everyone's experience is so different and diverse that they see a slightlky different slice of life. It's exhilerating! 

What does the future hold for user experiences? Take a peek what the writers at UX Magazine think! 

(I think we will see a surge in community activity and the online/offline community coming together. And we will see mega-apps that will consolidate the APIs of other apps because we have too many apps - not a bad thing, but we have too many that we don't use!).

What will online communities start to look like in the future? The blurred lines between the online and offline world.

I wrote an editorial piece for Launch DFW that explores what this may look like. I think we will combine the two worlds together to have a seamless experience. If anything, the online world will complement what happens in real life.

This is already happening in the shared economy. People need to interact with each other in real life to purchase anything and have a transaction, which is building trust between strangers. Trust is the key ingredient for communities to take off...without it, there is no way to create a community. 

But I won't bore you with the details - enjoy! 

2016: Expanding Online Communities that Embrace the Best of Both Worlds