How to create an 11-star experience

FOUNDER'S DIARY

I get asked a lot about how to gain and keep happy customers. Well, it all boils down to the experience. Let me explain:

You may already know that?customer service?is a huge part of any business. But do you know that?customer experience?is just as important? There’s a big difference between the two.

Customer experience?is about building out a complete experience for your customer, client, user, or whomever your business serves. It’s more than?customer service, which comprises things like?answering questions about an order status or updating someone's account information.?

A great customer experience (or, as Brian Chesky likes to say, an 11-star experience) has a few ingredients, including:?

1. A shareable product.?Your product probably won’t be the only one like it out there, but if the experience of getting it and using it makes people feel like it’s the only one, you’ll beat the competition.
2. Compelling content.?Compelling content is what your brand or service needs in order to create its own buzz. It’s what helps increase brand awareness and prompts others to want to share and interact with your brand.
3. Incredible packaging.?Think about the grocery aisle or walking into Sephora to pick out a new mascara. Where does your eye stop first among the countless products on the shelves? It’s not the boring store-brand products, that’s for sure. Make sure you have packaging that stands out from the competition.
4. An easy-to-use website with a clean checkout flow.?When was the last time you waited for a page to load before just closing out of the page itself? Don’t risk customer abandonment because your website sucks (this includes your checkout). You got them to your website, they’ve added your product to their cart, and now they can’t buy it?! Yikes. Don’t let this happen to you.
5. Great & memorable interactions with your brand/service/environment.?Do you remember the children’s story?The Princess and The Pea? The princess could feel that pea through a pile of a million mattresses. Your customer is just like that. They feel everything, no matter how tiny. And the ones who have a great experience have the potential to turn into influencers for your brand.

If you follow all of these steps, you’ll ensure that your Perfect Passenger is over-the-moon excited with every interaction they have with your business. They might even become free publicity by sharing that awesome experience with friends or their socials. And nothing is better than that!

Have a service-based business? I’ll be back next week with some tips for you, too!

THE TAKEAWAY

A great customer experience sets you apart from your competition. Turn your most loyal customers into influencers to grow your business…fast.