“Where does your brand begin and end? Where does your marketing stop and delivering online start? With cloud computing, online purchases, SAAS use, and live support in social forums, can you even define where your product experience begins and ends? These days you cannot and should not even try. Successful companies have prospered in response to these mega trends by taking the holistic approach”
—Daniel Rosenberg, SVP Product UX, SAP, The Customer Experience Revolution
The customer experience is the sum total of all interactions a person has with a company and its brand. The best brand experiences deliberately evoke strong emotions: attraction, trust, fun. Experiences with a strong emotional connection can create long-lasting customer relationships and fanatical advocates.
The emotional connection that customers make with a company’s products and services is just as important, or more important, than making an efficient product or delivering an effective service. The emotional connection shapes peoples’ perceptions of the company, its products, services, and brand. People make purchase decisions about how they feel about things. And if the feeling is strong enough, they will justify their decisions to support their emotional connection.
If a company consistently delivers a better experience than its competition, then customers will develop a high level of trust with the company and the brand. If the company consistently delivers a great experience, then the company has won a long-lasting customer and advocate who will likely tell other potential customers.
Your brand can either draw your customer towards your products and services or away from it. A great customer experience can elevate a purchase from a need to a desire. Smart companies are building relationships with their brand to create long-term value. They are developing enduring emotional connections with their customers to secure their brand and trust.