Even if customers are wired to remember the negative, you can make a positive customer experience with your brand more memorable. You can influence your customers to remember the value in what you do for them. In subtle and consistent ways.
I heard something I thought was funny about leadership. When asked what good leadership is, most people point to examples of bad leadership. But they find it difficult to describe what good leadership really is. They say they know it when they see it. Yet find it difficult to put into words.
The same thing applies to customer experience.
We can all share that awful horrible experience we had.
Waiting forever on hold only to find out that the support person can’t really help us. Receiving multiple requests for a sales meeting for something you’ve already communicate that you don’t want or need. Signing up for a service and then finding out there is a steep and long learning curve to get it working.
Yet can we quickly recall a positive customer experience? Often not.
A large part of it is because of how our brains work. Humans are naturally wired to focus on problems. To see the negative. To see risk. It’s part of our evolution.
It’s also because a positive customer experience is one that flows. As in the state of flow. Focused. Present. It’s kind of like you know when you are hungry or full. Yet do you recognize when you are sated?
When you are really dialed in, you lose that outside awareness.
So how do you handle these two goals. You want our customers to be satisfied and get what they need at every touchpoint. Yet you also want these touchpoints to also be memorable.
Here are a few ideas.
End with an echo
This works in most touchpoints. A sales call. Service calls. A training workshop. A marketing content piece.
End on a high. Summarize the positive things that happened in the engagement. And echo it back as a positive customer experience.
Make the last thing they get from the touchpoint be the thing you want them to remember. The positive experience.
It’s why I find the “do you want fries with that” question so annoying. I know it works, or they wouldn’t be doing it. But it’s often where they end.
If the last thing you do with a customer is an upsell, instead of a thank you for your business, then they might leave annoyed too.
Try to change the flow so that the upsell is not the last thing that you do. Do it earlier, and sum up the positive as the last thing
Invite them to take an action
Any action will do. If the customer takes a positive action after the engagement, it will cement into their memory what they liked about this one.
If a sale, invite them to do a social share of them using the product.
Ask for a review. Have them recommend a friend. Give them a discount on next time.
There are lots of things that you can suggest that they do. Having them do it will make them remember the engagement more than you are doing it for them.
As for a reference. Or a testimonial. Get them to put into words what they liked about the engagement. Expressing it will make them remember it more.
Express gratitude or congratulate
Everyone likes to be thanked. Or congratulated on an achievement.
Make you thank you descriptive and specific. Make the thank you about them, rather than about you. Add some stickiness to it.
“Enjoy those fries” Is much stronger than “thank you for buying from us”.
Celebrate what they will do with the purchase. Or download. Or support fix.
Follow-up
Any of the above can be done as a next action if you think that doing them in the moment would interfere with the flow.
Or follow up with a request for a survey. Ask for feedback in terms of what went well for them. Not just about where you can improve.
Be curious about what works and focus on repeating that.
Finally,
Even if customers are wired to remember the negative, you can make a positive customer experience with your brand more memorable. You can influence your customers to remember the value in what you do for them. In subtle and consistent ways.
- End each touchpoint on a high note, echoing back the positive thing that happened.
- Invite them to take an immediate action that will help them retain the memory.
- Create a thank you that celebrates them rather than you.
- Use follow up as a way to make them recall the positive
Making your customer touchpoints memorable for all the right reasons. The positives. The successes. The celebrations. Create great memories together and customers will come back. Again and again.
And…. if you agree these are great ideas, share a story on LinkedIn about how you see it fitting into your customer experience flow. And tag valueSTK! Let’s celebrate together.
