Xperience This!

Note: This post is an abridged version of Jerilyn’s whitepaper called Why Personas Matter.

So many times when I start a presentation on personas and the value they bring to any organization (whether it is a development team, a creative design team, or yes – even a marketing team), the push back I face is the perception that personas are really just “fluff” that cannot enable decisions and effect the bottom line.  In my experience, that is just not the case.  I have seen great products fail because the product engineers started with a set of cool features and later looked for a customer segment that might use them.  I have also seen mediocre products succeed because instead of building a segment around the product, the team started with a set of individual people, trying to accomplish specific tasks… and then built a product that could help them accomplish their goals.  

How did personas help them do that?  Simple – they were based on research and facts (not archetypes or assumptions) and focused on behaviors, not segmentation data that represents how the business views its customers instead of how customers view themselves. More »

Let me tell you a story…
You probably have one like it, so I’ll keep it short. It’s about a company’s strategic alignment of its people and systems to assure I have a particular customer experience. And it’s about why I’ll never do business with that company again.

This is about the bank that “serviced” (I use the word loosely) my home equity line of credit (HELOC), and it goes something like this…

Chapter 1) I dutifully make my monthly payments early for three years.

Chapter 2) The bank’s automatic reappraisal of the value of my home leads to a form letter saying I can no longer access my credit line.

Chapter 3) I call and am told my house has been compared to selling prices of others in the area. I inform my Customer Service rep the comparables they used don’t match my house. “That’s what our records show for your address. Sorry, there’s nothing I can do.” Of course not.

Chapter 4) I dutifully continue paying down my outstanding balance waiting for the HELOC to be automatically restored at a new, lower level.

Chapter 5) No restoration notice arrives even as I approach a zero balance, so I go to their web site. I find the option to email them. The error message tells me I have to register before I can send them an email. Register? That provides no value to me, but okay. I enter my loan number and it isn’t recognized. I can’t register!

Chapter 6) I call, again. After deciphering the automated call center menu, I reach a Customer Service representative who can’t help me (irony). I need to talk to someone who deals with reactivating accounts, which apparently doesn’t qualify as a customer service.

Chapter 7) I am transferred. Several static-filled muzak minutes later, I have another human being on the line.

Denouement:  Here’s the deal: If I want the HELOC reactivated I have to pay for an appraisal and reapply.

Post Script:  Really!  I mean, really?!  Are you kidding me?

Systems and desired experience not aligned

What I have just described is a bank’s integrated online and offline “Customer Service” system that is seemingly strategically devoted to making my experience of doing business with them so painful that I will refuse to go through the experience ever again. Do you think that is in their mission statement? More »