Steve McCallion’s Fast Company article, Building Consumer Experience Value Using the Power of Metaphors, provides another avenue to explore when trying to think outside your current box.
He says that thinking about innovation has shifted from products to consumer experience and provides examples of businesses that have used a focus on experience to build market share.
“A lot of companies struggle with the idea that this orchestration can create significant value. They are often looking for a silver bullet–a single product concept that they can patent and protect. But with experience innovation, the organizational device that holds a collection of products and services together is critical to value creation–the silver bullet is often a metaphor.”
McCallion cites Whole Foods metaphor of an outdoor market bazaar, and Apple’s learning centre metaphor.
So here’s the question to consider as you continue to work with your mission, vision and values statements:
What metaphor will add value to your customer experience?
1. Beauty lifts the spirit.
Whether you bring your service or product directly to the consumer or deal business to business, what helps you create a business environment that gives your customer an experience that lifts the spirit has never been more important. The more the world focuses on cutting costs, cutting back, and celebrating doom and gloom, the greater the need for beauty and for an emotional connection.
2. Beauty makes the ordinary an experience.
Beauty can turn a chore into an experience that we want to have again. Beauty, whether created through design or through nature, draws people to it. When something you have to do, becomes something you enjoy, you’re likely to come back. When we see something we find beautiful, our heart opens and there’s a pause, even if only for a moment.
3. Beauty is memorable.
Aside from our desire to purchase beautiful things, we remember beauty, and it becomes a point of difference. Whether it’s the difference between Apple’s standout design and a slew of ordinary PC laptops, or the community garden spots at the centre of traffic roundabouts, and a concrete circle without plants, beauty refreshes us, and the memory lingers.
