E-commerce Link : It's All About Experience

Bolster your digital strategy with experience models

In looking at the high-level outdoor space experience model (shown in the mediaplayer at right) you’ll notice that we divided the process of creating and maintaining an outdoor space into three major steps or stages:

• Planning
• Using
• Hibernating

Each of these steps is then broken down into more detail. In the case of “Use”:

• Installing
• Troubleshooting
• Enjoying
• Maintaining

Each of these individual sub-steps can then be looked at even more carefully to fully understand the associated bright spots, pain points and gaps that come with each. In our example, further exploration of “maintain” uncovers such pain points as:

• Maintaining a full birdfeeder.
• Keeping the grass and garden appropriately watered.
• Dissuading bugs and critters from snacking on flowers, herbs and vegetables.

Dig Into the Details
It’s looking at this lowest level of detail that inspires ideas for online opportunities. Given these details, our team came up with a slew of innovative digital ideas for our prospective client including:

• Allowing subscription to an automatic birdseed replenishment program, where the customer’s credit card is debited and seed is delivered according to pre-determined intervals.
• Sending personalized e-mail and text alerts based on the customer’s weather and garden profile. “It’s 85 degrees and sunny today in Chicago. Remember to water your lawn after 5 p.m. to prevent burning.”
• Featuring the best-kept tips and tricks from the pros to help the weekend gardener maintain a beautiful backyard. “Using a spray bottle, spritz the leaves of young shrubs and trees with lightly soapy water. This will help keep bugs like gnats and aphids at bay.”

Paint the Picture
The beauty of an experience model is it allows you to simplify and organize a complex reality enough to be able to succinctly understand the big picture, while still allowing access to the details that are necessary for brainstorming and ideation.

Good models use primary research as well as first-hand experience to help determine the shape of a process. They can also use a range of media to tell the story. Photos, videos and sketches taken during research not only help inform the model, but they can also be used within the actual model itself to illustrate and drive home the stages of the experience. These types of visuals and diagrams make the model a more compelling tool for explaining complex behaviors to clients and internal teams.

Here’s a list of things to think about as you start creating experience models of your own:

• Be collaborative. Experience models are only as useful as they are accurate. The bias of individual thinking can really skew the way a model comes together. Instead, get snacks, Post-Its, a whiteboard and a bunch of smart people in a room.

• Don’t forget the point of view you’re modeling. It’s so easy to slip back into company-centric thinking. Resist the urge. Don’t use company terminology. Don’t be swayed by company goals or politics.

• Grab your camera. The main input to your experience model is the work you’ve done during the discovery phase of your project. Get into people’s lives. Take
pictures. Understand.

• Don’t get stuck on the formal part of the experience. Some of the biggest opportunities come from the little or unexpected nuances that customers face. Planting a tomato plant is an obvious part of the lawn and garden process. Entertaining a child who wants to help dig in the dirt is where things get interesting.

In addition to the outdoor space and snacking models described earlier, I’ve also included examples of high-level models for car battery jumpers and kitchen remodelers (view in the mediaplayer to the right). If you end up using this technique in your own work, please pass your experience models along. We’re suckers for the creative work that’s happening in the world.

Cristin Siegel is the director of user experience and research at Chicago-based interactive agency Designkitchen. She can be reached at cristin.siegel@designkitchen.com

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