The way we design and deliver spiky experiences

Designing a memorable experience requires both art and science. The people in the alliance work together in a coordinated way that both generates strong experience ideas, but also builds them into the organization.

A full experience design project follows the steps set out in the table below:

Preliminary assessment - we spend some time observing a prospective client’s situation. Findings from each skill area (see the page entitled “Experienced in experience- all in one team”) are fed into a feedback session from which a broadly costed set of options for a project process is prepared and a quote for early steps. Generally, one of three scenarios will be most relevant:

• Vision or brand ready for energising
• An existing “rough diamond” experience ready for polishing
• Experience and promises do not mesh
  (see the page entitled “What we can do for you”)

Usually a client will choose between three ways of working:

• Collaboratively: where Alliance people and a client team work together closely to design an experience
• Consultatatively: where the Alliance does most of the work because the client is stretched for resources at that time, but the client makes decisions progressively through the project at important points
• Expert recommendations: the Alliance is given the mandate to work with whoever they need to come up with a recommended pathway for moving forward

Booster session - we have found it worthwhile spending some time with a client looking at best practice examples of customer experiences and working out what the concept could actually mean for them. This is particularly important when a collaborative process is used

Flush out insights - a proprietary process is used to map out from a customer point of view exactly what customer experience is happening now. A combination of in-house working sessions and some (optional) interviews or observations with customers is used to uncover insights into key customer concerns and motivations

Choose a spiky experience option - a dozen best practice customer experience strategies are put up against the current situation. The dozen choices are whittled down to just one and then the Alliance ideas team generates a selection of spike ideas, each of which are practical ways to execute the chosen strategy. The selection is narrowed down to a small number of favoured ideas and the process leads to a final experience concept. A business case can be prepared.

Engineer the spike into existing processes - this concept is engineered into the existing experience map and depicted graphically, so that it is easy to understand for those responsible for delivering it.

Roadmap - how the agreed experience concept will be developed and delivered, and by whom, is the focus for the roadmap. It uses a checklist approach for pulling together an integrated implementation plan and a timeline with milestones.

Practical action - the Alliance has people able to help with the practical challenges of getting people, systems, processes and structures ready to deliver the agreed experience.

Brand communications work - it also may be that communications need to be better aligned to the experience. Alliance specialists can help out here and work within existing relationships

Monitor and refresh - the Alliance offers the special ability to not just help monitor the success of an experience initiative, but also tie it to the bottom line. Depending on how fast moving an industry is and its degree of turbulence, the execution of an experience may require periodic enhancement to keep it refreshed. An optional review of ROI is available
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