We Buy the Experience Before We Buy the Pitch
The better experience we have around a product message, the better we feel about investing in that message and its messenger.
Most of us never think about the brand story as we walk into a store or hop online to make a purchase. But the better our point-of-sale (POS) experience, the more connected we become to that store, that site, or that brand.
For example, regardless of friend recommendations or advertisement incentives, I always log onto Expedia as my travel expeditor rather than Booking.com, Trivago, Hotels.com, or Priceline. I prefer the Expedia engagement experience to these other options. And I'll drive further to shop at Micro Center instead of Staples, Office Depot, or Best Buy because I prefer Micro Center's retail experience over the rest.
Promotion + Platform + Product
Experience is a key #CorporateStorytelling differentiator for any brand to register impact or lose connection with their intended audience. A standard product story says, “We sell appliances, you need an appliance, we're the cheapest, come buy our appliance.” The experience story says, “You can buy an appliance anywhere, we all sell the same things, but we invest in giving you the best experience, the best people, the best environment to shop in, the easiest purchase process, and the best engagement, along with the best price.”
A long term Marketing Dive study of more than 3,000 shoppers showed 82% of purchase decisions are made in the store or on the website, including 62% impulse buys. The experience—in this case, the physical, technical, and personal influences of the store or site—changes product investment decisions in the moment. Customer choice is about where and how a product as much or more than the product attributes or cost.
Our Message at the POS
Any talk we deliver or message we share—internally to our teams or externally to our customers—has the same #CorporateStorytelling point-of-sale impact. When our message includes a connective experience, our audience is more likely to make an in-the-moment decision to buy what we have to say right there at the POS. When we ignore experience and focus solely on price, process, and pitch, our audience is less likely to invest time or money in what we want to tell or sell them. Worse, they're less likely to trust the next story we try to share.
The Brand Experience
Starbucks crafts an experience around an average and overpriced cup of corporate coffee that includes local culture, personalized service, interactive ability for customers to connect to free WiFi, select their music through apps, customize drinks, even find a free and clean restroom anywhere in the world. Apple sells its dramatically expensive and technically inferior phone through an experience of sleek, futuristic, minimalist layouts and portals, with free and personal Genius Bars to answer questions and solve problems, on-the-spot repairs or replacements, streamlined interoperation, and a sense of belonging and personal empowerment.
The experience is almost always worth more to a brand and to the customer than the product that brand markets. When we host a meeting, gather our team for a reset or debrief, or speak from the stage or on camera, the experience we create means more to our audience than the data or statistics in our content.
Bottom Line
Carl W. Buehner said, They may not remember what you tell them, but they will always remember how you made them feel. The experience we offer along with the pitch is the feeling our target marketplace will remember most.
