Design Your Brand Experience for Tomorrow
How quickly are your customers’ expectations changing? In many industries, it’s happening faster than many people realize.
And you’re putting your brand at risk if you’re not preparing for it.
Technology is dramatically transforming how people interact with brands. In our previous post, Brian Solis talked in detail about how the role of experience is changing brands. If you don’t have time to listen to the podcast, take a few minutes now to consider how certain brands are affecting our behaviors today, and what that could mean for your brand tomorrow.
Think about your experience with Amazon: the comfort you get by being able to return anything for 30 days; the ability to find almost any product; and for many, the ability to have items delivered to your door within hours of ordering them. Once you become accustomed to this, it’s frustrating to deal with brands with onerous return policies, limited selection and long delivery times.
Think about how Uber has transformed transportation. Uber riders have become accustomed to being able to request an inexpensive ride, from a friendly driver, in a newer car, within moments of tapping the app on their phone. And then they rate their experience.
And if you’re single, think about your experience using Tinder or Bumble. Swipe right on your way to work and have a date lined up for the evening.
Like it or not, people’s expectations are changing.
We’re becoming conditioned to finding what we want, via our mobile devices, having it delivered to us in real time (or near real time) and enjoying the experience.
And if we don’t, we broadcast it to our community network via social media.
The New Expectations for Brand Experience
The bar has been raised dramatically in many industries. And because we’re all consumers who will be affected by this shift, we’ll begin to expect it to be the “new normal.”
We’ll expect it from our bank. We’ll expect it from our auto mechanic. We’ll expect it from our doctor.
We’ll probably expect it from your brand too.
As Brian cautions, if you’re relying on a 60-year-old business model to market, sell and engage your customers, your brand is at risk in the future. The idea of brand identity is eroding in favor of how people are seeing brands or want to see brands, or how they’re making decisions about lifestyles – all informed by the communities that they participate in.
To prepare your brand, think about removing friction at each interaction with your market. How can you enhance the experience you deliver? How can you deliver your product or service the way that Uber, Amazon and Tinder users would want it? How can you make your customers enjoy engaging with your brand to the point that they share it in their community?
Challenge yourself to design a new experience for your future brand. Start from a blank canvas. This can be the starting point for your future strategic development.
Here are two plans that can help: