Experience Economy

Page 57 of the book Priceless: Turning Ordinary Products into Extraordinary Experiences: - a customer went to a store to buy a can opener, but it was on a shelf 12 feet high, so she picked another product. Bad product placement, and bad experience!

What do you think - do libraries do this? With high shelving, sure - but also by making our information hard to find. For example… A new book can be:

• on a new books shelf
• a genre shelf
• a themed display
• in the kids or adults section
• on the normal shelf
• Or checked out

And the library catalog doesn’t always provide this type of detail to our customers. The catalog entry might say nothing more than “new books” - but our customer is left scratching his head, wondering “where is ‘New Books’?” Another good one - a library catalog entry might say “browsing collection” - huh?

We need to provide clear direction so customers can quickly and painlessly find our stuff - thus providing a positive experience. And, simple as this might seem… customers want to repeat positive experiences.

Pg 50 of the book Priceless: Turning Ordinary Products into Extraordinary Experiences: - a discussion on Apple and iMacs. When the iMac was marketed, Apple targeted young people who wanted to be online, but were afraid of technology. Apple’s ads clearly demonstrated how easy it was to get online using, of all things, an iMac.

What did Apple do? They targeted a niche audience (young people wanting to connect to the Internet), and offered a solution to that niche audience’s problem (difficulty in getting online). Did you read that? Apple didn’t offer a product - instead, they basically offered an EXPERIENCE that their target group wanted. The product was merely a means to an end (that of easily connecting to the web).

How can libraries mimic that type of “experience offering?” Here’s some ideas:

• We can target a niche audience with focused information - information they want. This way, we’re providing the experience of finding answers.
• Does a certain audience have problems? I’m thinking seniors = healthcare issues, young singles = careers, etc. Libraries can offer information-based solutions to these needs and problems, and provide many positive experiences.
• In general, we can offer a positive experience when customers visit our website by providing good, clear information, easy and clear ways of navigating our website, and create a pleasant-looking page.

I was reading through Jenny’s post of the highlights of Stephen Abram’s presentation, and saw this:

“losing “viewing their eyes” in the virtual world (can’t see facial expressions)
— have to figure out how to deliver experience/interaction online
— where community is the goal”

I find this extremely cool, since I’ve been interested in online experience planning… more later.

Pg. 43 of the book Priceless: Turning Ordinary Products into Extraordinary Experiences:

• Disney released the Lion King computer game just befrore Christmas…
• … but didn’t think through the experience they were going to provide (on Christmas morning)
• They got lots of angry calls, because the software wasn’t easy to install (and there were lots of kids who wanted to play their new games!)

Next christmas Disney wised up. They released another computer game, but this time they planned for their customer’s Christmas morning experience:

1. They sent clear instructions
2. They sent a separate note with the instructions advising parents to test the game out before Christmas morning
3. They sent a clearly labeled 1-800 support number with the instructions

Believe it or not, this DOES apply to libraries. What is the experience we want to leave our library customers with when they visit our website? FIGURE THAT OUT - and then plan services accordingly. Another way to ask this question - What do we want the customer to leave with when they visit our website? A call number? A book that’s been placed on hold? An article? A list of hot resources the library owns? Or the knowledge that our board voted on carpet colors (egad!)? Answer that question, and then use the website as a tool to point the customer to appropriate resources - the resources that answer the question and/or fill the need being addressed.

The tricky part is that we want the library website customer to leave with more than one thing when they visit our website - so we have to think globally about our resources.

This question works well for a library’s physical building, too: what do we want the customer to leave with when they visit us in-person? And, is our physical building, signage, and arrangement set up to help the customer leave with those things?

Hmm… stuff to think about…

The last few weeks I’ve been learning about experience planning - and trying to figure out how it works for libraries, especially library websites. So, what is experience planning? To get the complete picture, read The Experience Economy by B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore. In a nutshell, they examined the experience, rather than the product, as a marketable commodity. It’s a cool idea that translates well to a library setting… and it’s just gotta work for websites, too!

Before I get to The Experience Economy, I read through this book - Priceless: Turning Ordinary Products into Extraordinary Experiences by Diana LaSalle and Terry A. Britton. My next few posts will play off ideas presented in this book, and will attempt to relate those ideas and thoughts to libraries and library websites.

Pg 29: “first and foremost, an experience begins with an interaction between a customer and a product, a company, or its representative. So, by definition, an experience cannot happen without the customer’s involvement. This is a critial point, because it requires a shift in thinking from consumers as customers to consumers as participants. You can’t do it alone.”“Once the interaction takes place, a reaction occurs.”

The goal is to have the reaction mentioned above be a positive one. How can that happen on a library website? Here are a few ideas:

1. Try to put things where people might look (usability)
2. Offer people information they actually want (focus groups)
3. Provide a pleasing experience - one with a good feel to it (this one’s the hard one!)

Here’s another, slightly related idea. A few weeks ago, I participated in a library manager’s planning day for my library. The speaker was talking about experience planning, and had some good points. One of those points went something like this: if you want to attract a certain group of people to your facility, go where that group hangs out and then design accordingly. His example focused on a library (I believe it was the Singapore Public Library) that built a fun branch at a shopping mall - they were going for teens, who hung out at the mall. And the branch didn’t look much like a library - it really resembled a cool bookstore that would be in a mall.

But when I heard this, I was itching to try it out for websites, too! So here’s the plan: ask library customers to take a quick survey at the circ desk and online. Ask them to name their top five favorite, most visited websites. Maybe ask their age, too.

Once we have that information, it’s a short step to visiting those websites and to start figuring out what we can incorporate (ie., copy, steal, etc) into our library websites. For example: Do those popular websites use a certain navigational structure? Do they feature certain types of graphics, or have a similar look-and-feel? How is information presented on the site? Ask yourself these types of questions, and then compare those popular websites to your library website - and see what needs to be changed.

Why? The goal here is to provide a similar online experience - and to ultimately turn your library website into one of those top five most visited sites!