Insights into Customer Experience

You’re walking down a city street, stomach grumbling, looking for some place to eat. You come upon two restaurants next to each other — one is mostly full, one is mostly empty. Which one seems the safer bet?

Our instincts are to think that the one with more people must have the better food, service, or both. Or maybe it’s just a better place to be seen at. If you chose to eat at the crowded establishment, your very presence there is marketing to the next passer-by an inferred value proposition. This business is, in fact, extracting a service from you.

The same holds true if you walk around with a Starbucks cup, wear an Ed Hardy t-shirt, or are seen walking into a Barnes & Noble. Your interaction with these brands endorses and markets them.

So why aren’t brands paying us for this valuable service? Or put more practically, why aren’t their products and services appropriately “discounted” to factor in the time that we put in to market them?

Jet Blue understands that broadcasting the latest press release definitely doesn't cut it.

If your twitter stream is the real-time expression of your brand, what is it saying about you?

Today's marketplace would make Charles Darwin giddy. In an era of extreme bailouts, write-downs and an ailing economy, customers’ faith in corporate decision-making and brand loyalty will forever be changed.

How many brands do you know that inspire this level of customer affinity? When’s the last time you felt this way about a product or service?