Feedback to CustomerThink 01

Below is a comment I made for a blog written by Graham Hill at www.customerthink.com. His blog can be viewed at www.customerthink.com/blog/experience_mumbo_jumbo.
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Graham, I like your thinking.

Although touchpoint is usually "too short", it is always the little things that count. One simple touchpoint experience can have significant impact on an individual's total perception of an episode.

If finding a trolley is not an enjoyable experience, then the customer can have two choices. He or she can either continue finding the trolley, or just leave the premise and visit another shopping mall nearby. That "finding a trolley" process is then the little thing, and that little thing can already provide either positive or negative experience to customer.

Touchpoint is mutual, because it is an interaction. Persons involved can control where and when the touchpoint takes place. But experience is personal and unique. It is beyond everyone's control.

Berndt Schmitt's "Customer Experience Management" is a good book. He talks a lot about how to deliver experience, but it's more important to know what and where to deliver experience. I suggested earlier the idea of managing "People, Information and Deliverables" to deliver experience. That's the what.

Last but not least, in the HBR article "Putting the Service Profit Chain to Work," Heskett suggests that "profitability depends not only on placing hard values on soft measures but also on linking those individual measures together into a comprehensive service picture." Focusing on Customer Experience alone no longer ensures succuess. Winning requires an optimal balance between internal organization (yin) and external market (yang).

I've been studying touchpoint experience for almost 10 years. The more I read, the more I realize how little I know about touchpoint experience. I hope I am not in your list of confusing mumbo jumbo.

Daryl Choy, the founder of WisdomBoom and Touchpoint eXperience Management, helps firms make a difference at every touchpoint. Choy can be reached at http://wisdomboom.blogspot.com.