The secret: delighting your customers
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The UAE will rewrite history in the next 5 years in terms of defining what a 21st century government is, says global expert Lou Carbone, founder of the US-based Experience Engineering. He made these comments on Day 2 of the Government Summit as he discussed the secret to delighting customers. Such satisfaction, he said, lies in how companies manage the experience of their customers, which will then define how important a firm becomes.
In a talk during a session titled ‘The Secret: Delighting Your Customers,’ Carbone outlined five important or “absolute” aspects of experience management. “The effect on people is the real value that we create on other people's lives,” he told session participants.
Carbone is recognised as the leader who launched the experience movement in the early 1990s. Through his book ‘Clued In,’ he delivers a thought-provoking programme on how to connect emotionally with customers.
Rising citizen expectations and the global drive towards competitiveness have propelled governments to enhance the design and delivery of government services to move beyond simply meeting the needs of citizens. Citing the experience of a number of household-name firms, Carbone said that their success may be attributed largely on the experience that they managed to create among customers.
Starbucks for instance has instituted the look and feel of a cosy hang-out place, a deviation from a place that used to only sell coffee. FedEx, for its part, has managed to create a system where customers may be able to track their packages.
Their product, as such, becomes very relevant and very differentiated, allowing premium pricing. Experience, he said, is the ‘bedrock’ of the value that these firms provide. The value is the effect and not the functions of a product or service provider.
In terms of the five absolutes to experience management, according to Carbone, first, a company must move from “make and sell” to “sense and repair.” A company must be able to identify what becomes critical in this era, and it is just important to be able to differentiate “what is a nice touch and what is too much,” he said.
Second, a company must thank its customers back. How people feel in an experience subconsciously becomes the basis of how they feel about government agencies and government itself, he pointed out. How they feel about such experience is the most potent way to create emotional relations, he added.
Third, it must understand and leverage the role of the subconscious mind. This key point in experience management is exemplified by an act of many individuals, for instance, to pick the second, instead of the first in a file of newspapers for sale in a news stand.
Fourth, it must be clue conscious. And lastly, a company must be able to develop vigorous systems and develop and manage clues.
The people’s expectations are rising, which in turn drives governments to enhance the design and delivery of government services to move beyond simply meeting the needs of citizens.
In closing, Carbone said: “I am so excited about the journey you’re on and I hope that in some way I can contribute to that journey. It has the potential of rewriting history in terms of the government of the 21st century. In the next five years, I feel it would be done here. I feel so confident of what I heard over the past two days.” he said.
