So why isn’t your customer experience?
There. I said it out loud. It sucks to be your customer. Why?
- You don’t list the size information on the product page.
- Or you do list size information, but it’s generic for any brand, and you sell multiple brands.
- I was able to live chat with your customer support and they told me to look on the product page for the size info. When I said it wasn’t there, they told me I should Google it.
- I swear to God, your CSR told me to Google it.
- You spam me constantly on every social media channel telling me how great you are.
- You haven’t taught me anything.
- I have to Google it when I want to find out how to use your software.
- I don’t feel smarter for using your product.
- The ink level indicator only sort of works for your printer.
- When I replace the ink, sometimes it works, but sometimes not.
- When I go on your website to find out why the ink cartridge didn’t reset the ink level indicator, I can’t figure out why.
- When I get an error message, your website doesn’t tell me why, even if I search for that error message number.
- Your error messages don’t have numbers, so I can’t even Google them to find out what’s wrong.
- Your website must make sense to someone (surely), but I can’t find what I’m looking for.
- You use words that aren’t familiar to me, but I think you do offer the service I need. I just can’t figure out for sure.
- Every piece of marketing material you have requires me to talk to a person to get any real information. I’m trying to vet you before I invest in talking to a person.
- Every piece of valuable content on your site is a PDF. I am not downloading anything here.
- You seem like a great marketer, but I can’t tell if you’re just as great at what you do.
- Your design is slick and modern, but I can’t tell where to click or what to do.
- I’ve used your app dozens of times and I still can’t remember where to click to do what.
- Your instructions sound like they were written in another language and translated poorly into mine.
I could go on. Frankly, we’ve all been guilty of at least some of these things. So don’t think I’m speaking from on high here. In fact, many (but not all) of these things are hard to foresee if you’re part of the organization selling the product or service.
The Real Problem Is Communication
Many of your problems are actually just customer communication issues. You didn’t foresee what we needed to know. You assumed we knew something we didn’t. You assumed we called it the same thing you do. You assumed what was obvious to you would be obvious to us. You didn’t realize we’d need that piece of information to buy or use your product. You have the information but didn’t think to post it on your site. You spent so long designing your app you forgot what the first-time (or 25th-time) user experience felt like.
Content Strategy Fixes Your Customer Experience
Yep, it’s true. (I’m sure you’re not surprised at our position on this.) Whether you’re designing a product, creating a digital experience, or putting together instructional content or marketing information, defining and using a content strategy will help you ensure that your customer experience is just as transformative as your technology.