What do an 8 year old, a Pink concert and a packet of Gummy Bears have to do with CX?

While I’m sure many painful experiences (mortgage application anyone) could be improved with some Gummy Bears, a weekend spent listening to Pink's recent Sydney concert on repeat was a huge reminder of one of the most magical ingredients of a good customer experience.

Let me rewind a little…

Late last year I took my 8 year old daughter to the Pink concert. Parking any parental judgement right now, she’s a huge fan and I wanted to emulate a similar experience I had at 8 where I went to my first concert with my dad. I will never forget that Kylie Minogue concert, the excitement as I crimped my hair and put on my best bubble top. 

Fast forward a few decades, and as I sat there arm in arm belting out Pinks biggest hits, you are reminded of what sits behind the word ‘experience’ that those of us in CX use everyday.

It’s a shared bottle of $10 water because you weren’t allowed to bring your own.

It’s being allowed as an 8 year old to stay up until midnight on a school night.

It’s being fuelled by Gummy Bears at 9pm to keep you awake for all the dancing that is to come.

Its memories that will last a lifetime.

Bad selfies captured mid-ballad where you were having so much fun you can look past the crows feet and double chin.

It's amazing to think just 2 hours of my daughters life will take up a disproportionate amount of memory space.

She’ll probably forget the inevitable queue for the ladies toilets.

The 3 hours we sat in hard seats to wait for her to arrive.

Or how tired she was the next day.

Or how the loud music hurt her ears.

She’ll look past all that.

Now I’m sure the CX person from Qudos Bank Arena, or whatever the stadium is called these days, will pat themselves on the back and say the entry process was smooth, the food well resourced and the building clean and tidy.

But one thing they can not manufacture is emotion and even more importantly, the role emotion plays in creating memories.

Memories are amplified by emotions, often at either end of the spectrum.

EMOTION!

Not processes. Not your products. Not your stuff.

As you are looking to enhance the experiences your customers have with you, are you skipping over the role of emotion?

Have you even identified which emotions are at play during each stage of your customers journey?

I'm not just talking about putting a little 😫 emoji on a journey map, which were all guilty of.

I’m talking about really understanding what they’re thinking and feeling.

It’s a skill called empathy. A muscle those within organisations rarely flex. Nonetheless, it's one we must build for our customers now and the future Gummy Bear eating customers of generations to come.

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