[Experience Frontline] How does customer experience help companies capture customers’ decision-making minds?

The discussion of customer experience and customer mind has always been a hot topic in the industry. Enterprises have made various efforts and paid opportunity costs for it, hoping to capture customers' decision-making minds in the long term and achieve further growth. However, where should we start and where should we start? The author of this article shares his views, hoping to bring you some inspiration.

Discussions on customer experience and customer mindset have always been hot topics in the industry.

Enterprises have also made various efforts and incurred opportunity costs for this, trying to capture customers’ decision-making mindsets in the long term and achieve further growth through research and stimulation of existing customers in the era of experience economy.

However, there is still a feeling of powerlessness.

Where should we start and where should we exert our strength? Often, we only know the results but not the reasons.

The usual way companies and brands apply customer experience methods is to start from pain points and needs, try to solve more problems for customers, meet more customer needs, and even deliver experience value that exceeds expectations.

There is nothing wrong with doing this, but it is too rational on the corporate side.

Mind itself is a manifestation of a person's subjective way of thinking, which is mostly emotional.

However, if we only understand customers' pain points and needs from a rational perspective, we are only solving the superficial problems and are likely to ignore the deep emotional issues and expectations behind the rationality.

Let me give you a very simple example.

For a couple in love, on Valentine's Day, if the girlfriend says "It doesn't matter, I like it as long as it's from you" when asking for a gift, is that really the case?

It's possible, more likely not, and more likely not.

At this time, as a boyfriend, would you really just give a random gift? Or would you purposefully give a gift that is "from the heart"?

This all depends on your careful observation and your ability to understand and cluster potential needs. In any case, as long as you do it with your heart, you can capture your girlfriend's mind.

This is the way of thinking at the emotional level.

Therefore, if companies and brands want to truly capture the decision-making mindsets of customers, in addition to having professional rational analysis and problem-solving capabilities, they must also treat the relationship with customers as a romantic relationship and enhance their insight, understanding, and empathy for emotions.

Who the client belongs to depends largely on how sincere you are.

The picture is original by Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

First of all, when talking about the company’s performance in terms of experience, we must focus on the company’s understanding of experience.

We all know that customer experience has always been considered the "top priority project" or "CEO project" in an enterprise, and this cognitive direction is completely correct.

If an enterprise wants to achieve the smooth operation of customer experience management, the support, empowerment and authorization of management are extremely important strategic factors, which directly determine whether the enterprise can work together to improve customer experience and jointly promote the implementation of experience improvement.

However, when it comes to the word "management" in relation to customer experience, there will be resistance within the company to the very mention of management.

Therefore, we can change our perspective and try to understand how customer experience should be accepted within the organization and widely used as a "practical tool" that can reduce costs and increase efficiency.

In other words, experience can be used as an adjective project to empower experience-related capabilities within the organization to drive profit growth and realize experience value.

In this way, there is more that can be done with the experience.

The picture is original by Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

As mentioned above, mind is a manifestation of a person's subjective way of thinking.

Customer mind is a subjective way of thinking formed by customers in the process of interacting with brands. The conclusion of this thinking determines whether the price of your product or service is worth it in the minds of customers and whether your product is worth buying.

This mental model measures both perceived value and emotional value. In the process of customer mental maturity, companies should do something to influence customers' perceived value and emotional value, so as to obtain customers' real behavior through the performance of customers' minds.

Value-oriented customer behavior can be used to judge mental maturity and belonging.

For example.

When I was chatting with a friend on WeChat, I customized an emoticon pack specifically for him and sent it to him frequently during the communication process.

He was surprised and said: Why do you have so many emoticons?

I said: This is specially customized for you, just to enhance your experience of chatting with me and to convey emotional value. If you are willing to chat with me, I will hold you.

The picture is original by Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

In the experience economy, people consume based on perceived value.

Why do I say so?

Our brain is made up of two parts: rational and emotional.

When the rational left brain comes into play, the value judgment of a product or service is entirely based on its own capabilities, and the actual value of the product or service is used as the basis for consumption.

But when the right brain of emotional thinking begins to make judgments, the criteria are not based on the actual capabilities and value of the product or service itself, but on self-awareness and feelings dominated by emotional thinking.

Under this, people’s judgment of the value gap of products or services is a manifestation of perceived value.

In other words, how much your product or service is worth is determined by the consumer group itself.

Therefore, if companies and brands want to capture the minds of customers, they should strive to enhance the positive perceived value of their products or services and actively convey emotional value, which is the most direct and effective way.

The above two pictures are original works of Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

These are two typical cases in terms of perceived value and emotional value.

Heytea delivers the perceived value of its products and services.

Atour Hotel delivers positive emotional value step by step through the experience journey, ultimately achieving the development of customer minds.

Speaking of emotional value, it is a person's ability to influence the emotions of others and the ability to bring all good feelings to others.

Emotional value is not something that can be seen or touched; it is a feeling and sensation that can be conveyed.

Let’s take another simple example.

When you drag your tired body back home, you receive warm hugs and greetings from your lover and children. At this time, your fatigue is suddenly relieved and you can quickly integrate into the atmosphere of home. Then, your lover and children are conveying positive emotional value to you.

For a hotel, it is another "residence" for people besides their home. In such an unfamiliar environment, how to alleviate customers' sense of strangeness and insecurity, establish a familiar feeling of "home", and allow customers to experience the emotional release of "being at home" is a customer experience concept that the hotel industry needs to focus on.

Atour has achieved this.

The picture is original by Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

The experience journey is the key to good customer experience management.

The only way to improve customer experience is to manage the experience journey well and achieve the corporate goal of providing customers with a wonderful experience through continuous optimization and improvement of touch points.

The interaction process between customers and enterprises must start with products and be accompanied by subsequent services.

For customers, this process is also about building perceived value and delivering emotional value.

During this journey, only the company’s companionship can bring about the “beautiful scenery” for both parties.

The picture is original by Gangshu Experience Management, © Gangshu

Back to the actual operations of the business, what values ​​can be achieved by empowering and driving customer experience that are more beneficial to customers and businesses?

This value can be reflected in three aspects.

The customer's time share is to make the customer willing to spend time with you. The more time he spends with you, the greater the possibility of successful transactions with you.

Customer mind share means that your product occupies a larger share in the consumer's brain, so that once he thinks of products in this category, you will be the first one he thinks of.

Customer wallet share means the opportunity to get one person to buy your product multiple times when no more people are buying your product.

In a word, the implementation of customer experience must be based on the customer's psychology and the reality of the enterprise, and must be people-oriented in facing and solving problems.

By combining the experience journey and experience scenario methods, and implementing the three major rules for customer experience, and conveying positive perceptions and emotions to consumers and customers, ultimately for the company, it means achieving the expected growth curve, that is, seizing the customer's decision-making mindset for your company and brand.

Author: Gangshu@Experience Practitioner, WeChat public account: Gangshu Experience Management, columnist for Everyone is a Product Manager, independent consultant for experience management, and expert in customer experience management.