Astonishment Architecture
For the last 2 years or so I’ve been collecting and working on something I call “Astonishment Architecture”. It’s the thinking behind creating exceptional customer experiences before, during & after each customer touchpoint. I believe it’s one of the few competitive advantages left for creating raving fans and spreading word-of-mouth instead of trying to compete in noisy, crowded marketplaces. Watch the presentation below (that I’ve never shared with the general public before) and see what you think. Some of the slides need a little explanation but I think you’ll get the main points. Possible Astonishment Architecture Workshop: I was considering having a small, interactive workshop with “field trips” to a few businesses that practice this. The workshop probably wouldn’t be cheap since it would extremely intimate and we’d be brainstorming the creation of the Astonishment Architecture individually for your own business. Drop me a comment below and let me know what you think and if there’s enough interest I’ll put it together.
Hi Yanik,
You’re absolutely right! One of the last frontiers in creating raving fans and life long partners (not merely clients), is what I call Extreme Client Care(tm) — and what you’re calling Astonishment Architecture(tm).
When you start with the mindset of creating a positive experience for every touchpoint along The Client Journey (even before money exchanges hands) and design systems to support those experiences, you can’t help but be successful in everything you do.
With abundance,
Sandy
@Sandy – awesome! Would like to hear your version of this – I’m always intrigued/interested in great examples.
This is so vital now. I believe that we are now in the “Transparency Decade”. Treating your clients with contempt as some bigger and smaller businesses did during the last 10 years is no longer working (and it never should have but when there was so much abundance it did). With social media companies that do not respect their clients and provide an amazing experience will quickly be found out, especially with and because of social media.
The flip side is that if customers do as you say Yanik and go out of their way to blow their clients with amazing and unexpected experiences they will share this story with everyone too. Big and small businesses should be thinking how they can add this value to create the raving fans that every business needs to survive and thrive.
The only question is will enough business owners realise that this is exactly what they need to be doing RIGHT NOW, not WHEN THE ECONOMY PICKS UP as I hear so many saying. Doing it then will be too late as you may well be out of business!
People should be scrambling to take you up on this idea.
Yanik,
As always…LOVE this….you amaze and inspire me. I still think there is business to be done between us. This Deal of the Day concept is really taking off….let’s work together and knock it out of the park. (we have 3 million subscribers now, but looking to add a couple zeros to that)
Please contact me…
With Gratitude & Positive Intentions for YOUR Success,
Stacy L. Rosas
@Stacy – wow 3M subs is awesome. I have someone that might be interesting to hook you up with. Drop me a note.
Hey Yanik,
This is something I’ve really been noticing myself . Creating great experiences.
I’m having my third yacht mastermind this October and the two earlier in the year got amazing reviews.
I think this one in October is going to be the best yet. Will share feedback after!
Andrew (Foxy)
This is crucial these days. Providing a great experience will place you leaps and bounds above the competition. I love your creative mindset and how you go outside the limits the industry has placed on itself.
Much needed indeed. I may not attend a live event – but maybe a webinar series.
This is Great stuff! Not to mention a lost art in a world obsessed with mediocrity! I would love to have this presentation to share with my staff! Thank you Yanik for your Forward thinking and out of the box approach to life and business.
Hey Yanik,
Love it my man.
I was sitting and talking to Jake Weatherly in Eugene a couple weeks ago… about biz, life, entrepreneurship and other cool stuff… and one of the themes we hit was customer experience.
In my company… we’ve totally abolished the term “customer service” and replaced it with “customer experience” (a simple change). We have customer experience reps (no customer service people) and at every touch… even on our checkout page now we’re pointing out the experience they’re going to have with us… with a personal touch. Conversions immediately went up.
Also, it stretches into every touch point with customers, joint venture partners, vendors, etc. With our joint venture partners we ditched the term “affiliate or jv manager”. No-one likes to be managed. Its not fun. Instead, they’re now our Partner Concierge who is there for every beckon call for our partners. In addition, another way to astonish partners is to pay them quickly. Not in 2 or 3 weeks… but within days after they’ve sent their emails promoting our programs. We’ve been overnighting 50% of commission affiliate checks 72 hours after their promoting with us when they hit certain easy to attain numbers we’ve determined based on our refund rates. Thats resulted in our Partners referring other Partners to us because they’re not used to getting paid so darn quickly.
That change is relatively new so we’re still waiting to see how that affects the bottom line… but I know on our end it sure feels better making that chance.
Anyhow, I love the presentation and the idea. Creating an Architecture of Astonishment is something the companies who are going to separate from the pack are going to notice and implement… those who don’t will get driven closer to a commodity and “just like everyone else”.
Heck, one of the simplest things we’ve been doing for over a year with our online products of over $800 is they get a personal phone call from us (our customer experience rep) within 48 hours to welcome them into the team and see if they have any questions. We feel thats the right thing to do… our customers aren’t used to that so consistently we’ve been getting insane raving fans because of the process.
I love it Yanik. I’m looking forward to seeing what you’ve got in store. The really cool thing about you vs. most others in this space is you seem to think bigger. Your company right now might not be as big as some of those other guys… but your ideas are huge… and expand far beyond the IM world. I love it
- Trevor
@Trevor – very cool! I think language is HUGE! Creating the right language sets the framework for sure and I love when I see that in action. Nice job!
great stuff Yanik. Please keep me posted if you end up doing a workshop on this material
You have pointed some points which needs more discussion , even its true good client always require something unique but many one desires copied one . If you enjoy to make your own design but your client always requires a copied design your ability and skills of making design goes down … Correct me If I am wrong
[...] read it I knew we share some common “DNA” as I’ve been talking a lot about my concept called Astonishment Architecture™ [...]
That is some sweet shippicks there Yanik! Great preso!
[...] read it I knew we share some common “DNA” as I’ve been talking a lot about my concept called Astonishment Architecture™ [...]