Creating and managing Brand experiences on the internet

Dr Bernd Schmitt
Brand Consultant and Best Selling Author

INTRODUCTION
The Internet has changed many people’s lives - both as business people and as consumers. The web offers a world of information. It also offers cost savings and efficiency, thus increasing velocity in supply-chain management. Consumers have instant access to books, music and other goods, which are delivered right to their doorsteps. Ordinary transactions are made much easier. With a few clicks, consumers can book a flight and the lodging and rental car to go with it.
However, as most of us know all too well, the web also brings with it hassles and disappointments. Think about excessive download times, and then not being able to configure the new software for your system. Then there are the web sites that promise information but make it nearly impossible to get to it. Other sites are poorly structured, offer no contact information, or provide no follow-up service when something goes wrong.
By now, many companies have constructed their third- or fourth-generation web sites. Still, many are failing to deliver the right experience. Some companies’ sites look like little more than scanned-in corporate reports or product brochures. These “corporate brochure sites” are text- and information-heavy, and they are painfully boring. Such content-laden sites are in fact inappropriate for the medium of the web. They do not take advantage of the web’s unique strengths: the interlinked nature of many sites that invites browsing, the interactivity with the user, and the opportunity to customise the site for the user.
Just as bad is the opposite extreme: the “oh-so-webby” site. These sites are full of animation and sound (designed using the latest Flash technology) - they are long on bells and whistles but short on information value. They require long download times and all the latest plug-ins that many users do not have and will not bother to install.
And then there is the transaction-oriented, functional e-commerce site. Many of these e-commerce sites fail to deliver on what is supposed to be their core essence: an efficient transaction. Too often, customers have to click forever to get to the merchandise, and once they find it they cannot make much sense of the tiny static pictures that are provided. Most annoyingly, poor back-end support means that merchandise often arrives late or not at all, and the problem gets even worse during the times when the customer needs the product most, such as Christmas time.

MANAGING EXPERIENCES
IS KEY
What differentiates successful web sites from unsuccessful ones? Smart marketers know that it is a matter of understanding the on-line experience. And the icons in the technology world have recognised the importance of on-line experiences as well.
>Michael Dell, addressing the Detroit Economic Club in November 1999, argued that “the two top drivers of online loyalty are the quality of the customer experience and on-time delivery. I believe a company is vulnerable if this experience is not part of their differentiation. At Dell, we continue to focus on differentiating ourselves through a positive customer experience.”
>Bill Gates wrote in his book Business at the Speed of Thought: “The merchants who treat e-commerce as more than a digital cash register will do the best. Sales are the ultimate goal, of course, but the sale itself is only part of the on-line experience.
>Linus Torvalds, founder of Linux, in his keynote address at the LinuxWorld Conference and Expo in New York in February 2000, pointed out: “Technologists often forget the general user. Technology is only as good as the user experience.”
It is clear that none of the three common web sites discussed above - the corporate brochure site, the “oh-so-webby” site and the transactional site - delivers a satisfactory experience. But just exactly what is an online experience? What are satisfactory on-line experiences? What are the key design and management issues?
In this article, I will first give a brief definition of on-line experiences. I will then provide a framework for managing branded on-line experiences. The framework includes three key components: (1) an understanding of customers (including customer motivations and attitudes toward technology); (2) the management of the on-line presence (including web design, an understanding of experiential marketing, and the provision and management of standardised and customised elements); and (3) the provision of back-end support from a design, technology and management perspective (including site updates, service, and integration of the on-line presence with other communication elements). Finally, I will discuss three future-casts that may dramatically change the way experiences are created and managed on line.

WHAT ARE ON-LINE
EXPERIENCES?
On-line experiences are not synonymous with web sites. There is more to a successful on-line experience than just the web site itself. On-line experiences can include banner ads and sponsored content, news mailings, various forms of web PR (such as presence on chat rooms, newsgroups and other online communities), and the intranet communication system. However, the web site for the company and brand is the most visible and important element of the online experience. To be successful, companies need to be sure that their web sites provide the right experience for their customers. Therefore, this article focuses on the design, marketing and management of web sites.
Before we turn to the specific characteristics of on-line experiences, we need a better understanding of commercial experiences in general. Of course, commercial experiences occur not only on the web, but also in the supermarket, at a trade show, during a sales call, or in front of the TV.
These experiences are perceptions of the company or brand that result from the direct observation of or participation in events. Thus, commercial experiences have three characteristics in common:
>Because experiences are perceptions, they are subjective. Therefore, it is important to understand how we can get a customer to have a certain experience. The subjective world of the customer counts more than what may be most appropriate from a design perspective. As a result, when it comes to the experiential aspects of management and design rather than its functional aspects, designers and marketers need to adopt the customer’s perspective.
>Experiences result from an active and interactive engagement with the customer. Customers do not just observe, judge and form impressions as passive information processors; customers are part of an active relationship with the company or the brand. As a result, designers and marketers should encourage customer action and interaction to build relevant brand relationships.
>Experiences are processes that occur over time. That is, experiences are not static; they change as information changes. As a result, designers and marketers need to understand in which order to present information and how to present this information over time.
In non-web media, usually one of these characteristics of experiences will dominate (activity for a supermarket visit; active and interactive for sales calls; processes over time for watching ads). But for on-line experiences, all three characteristics - the subjective, activity and interactivity, and the phenomenon of processing over time - apply at the same time.
Thus, when customers visit a web site, they are in control: they actively judge the information presented to them; they actively search for information, and they determine the process over time by deciding when and where to click. Consequently, to create a satisfactory on-line experience, designers and managers need to provide opportunities for active and interactive customer processing of the site over time.
One more point. Web sites need to provide branded experiences. As Tom Peters wrote in The Circle of Innovation, “Brand! Brand!! Brand!!! That’s the message…in the late nineties and beyond.” Moreover, on the web “the brand is the experience and the experience is the brand.” Thus, a web site should be as instantly recognisable as other brand identifiers (logos, labels, retail spaces). Moreover, in the case of Internet start-ups, the web site should create a differentiated image and identity for the firm; in the case of an established brick-and-mortar company expanding on the web, the branded web site should enhance the image and identity.
Creating a branded on-line experience is not easy because of the lack of multi-sensory information, the lack of fast access and the fact that a competitor is only a mouse click away. However, as we will see, these limitations are likely to be challenges and opportunities that can be managed. Moreover, I expect them to disappear with broadband service, and more sophisticated audio and video. We will return to this point toward the end of the article when I present scenarios for the future.

THE EX FRAMEWORK
The EX framework for managing the on-line experience identifies three key management issues related first to customers, second to the type of web site that the company can create, and third to the back-end support system.

Customers
To create the right experience, managers need to segment their “e-customers.” Geographic, demographic or lifestyle characteristics (in B2C markets) as well as industry characteristics (in B2B markets) are useful; yet, as Forrester Research has found, attitude toward technology (pessimistic vs. optimistic) and the primary motivation for using technology (career, family, entertainment) are often better segmentation variables. Segmentation profiles are now widely available from firms such as Forrester Research, Roper Starch, Jupiter Communications, Scarborough Research and others. Such information can also be easily accessed on web research sites such as www.cyberatlas.com.
However, these broadly based customer data about new technologies need to be supplemented with an understanding of how users actually approach a given site. I have conducted research on this issue with a graduate student, Reimar Mueller. We found that customer expectations and user goals affect online behaviour and a site’s “stickiness,” including the probability of liking the site, browsing it, and book-marking it.
Customer expectations are often set up by a general knowledge of the company. Just imagine, for example, what kind of site you might expect from a company like American Express or Starbucks -what kind of look and feel, what kind of information. Moreover, a company’s advertising styles can also set up expectations for their web presence. When Visa, for instance, has an aggressive ad for its new “Next Card,” declaring that “Banks are History,” we expect a cutting-edge site to match the iconoclasm of the ad campaign. When we actually visit these sites, we may be positively impressed, or we may be disappointed. The expectations consumers bring to a site affect their online behaviour.
Goals are another important determinant of online behaviour. To put it simply, is the customer goal to seek content, to engage in a transaction, or perhaps to be entertained? The www.cnn.com site gets huge traffic every day, but people stay for only a short period to update information and news. By contrast, users go to the Encyclopaedia Britannica (www.britannica.com) site to gather intelligence and knowledge. It is important to understand these different goals when designing navigation structures, putting up search engines, and planning hyperlinks with other sites. Similarly, on an e-commerce site, does the user want to shop with one click or browse around a while before buying? Understanding users’ goals can help companies create satisfying online experiences for them.

The web site
The second key consideration is the type of web site to deliver the experience. First and foremost, a web site needs to have appropriate functional components: transparent site structure; easy navigation tools; and appropriate information exchange systems. And, because branded experiences matter, a web site also needs noticeable and differentiated brand identifiers such as a memorable URL and the right brand symbols (site logos, buttons, and other brand icons).
In addition the site, as a whole, needs to be experiential. In my book Experiential Marketing: How to Get Customers to Sense, Feel, Think, Act and Relate to Your Company and Brands, I distinguished five types of experiences that marketers can create for customers. These five experiential categories - sense, feel, think, act, and relate - are very relevant for understanding web site design. Sense sites appeal to the senses. They are beautiful, colourful, and evocative of sensual experiences. Feel sites appeal to the emotions: love, sympathy, outrage, etc. Think sites stimulate the intellect and challenge the mind. Act sites motivate a visitor to do something, to join in. Relate sites encourage visitors to identify with a particular social group and encourage consumers to feel themselves part of an online community. Many of the best sites have aspects of all these and thus deliver holistic experiences - the most complete and fulfilling of consumer experiences.
Finally, in every web site design, the issue of standardisation and customisation arises. Let me illustrate the choice by examining two web sites more closely: www.sephora.com, owned by LVMH, the French luxury products conglomerate, and www.reflect.com owned by Procter and Gamble. Sephora primarily uses a standardisation approach. As of the summer of 2000, the site sells major cosmetics brand unaltered. The experience at reflect.com is quite different. When customers first approached the site in the spring of 2000, they were told: “Please take a minute and answer a few questions that will help our beauty experts personalise a web site for you. Help us get to know you better by telling us about your desires, your needs, your lifestyle and your beauty sense.” Many of these questions are playful and creative, such as what consumers like to wear, what animal they would choose to be, what images they find most visually appealing. Based on that information, the site learns general aesthetic preferences, but the customer remains free to alter subsequent suggestions offered by the site. At the end, customers create their own products including product ingredients, packaging and messages.
The reflect.com site is well designed and allows for easy navigation. The key issue is whether customers care to customise their cosmetics products. If the customer’s goal is to minimising purchasing risks, then reflect.com may not provide the ideal experience. In this case, standardisation rather than customisation is most likely to be desirable for a sensory product like a cosmetic for which exploration is necessary. Currently, sensory products cannot be explored over the web (though this may change in the future).

Back-end support
The final factor of the EX framework is the back-end support system. From a technology perspective, this includes the management of the overall site architecture (e.g., of routers and connectivity tools), the database, payment systems, transaction or credit-card verification system, and other technological tools needed to manage the site and to deliver the goods.
From a design and marketing perspective, three issues are key: updates, service, and integration with other communications. Updates are necessary to accommodate new customers, new information and new technologies. Updates are thus part of the continuous improvement process on line, and are especially critical for content-heavy sites.
Service is a key part of customer relationship management. It is critical to interrelate service on and off line because service cannot be fully delivered online only. The telephone call centre that manages incoming and outgoing phone calls, the web site centre and other customer contacts need to be integrated. Every customer representative needs to have access to information about any sort of customer contact.
In addition, managers need to set up the right communication structures to blend web communications with other sorts of communications. Again, integration is key. The web site and the online experience it provides are not a stand-alone marketing and communications tool but rather part of a company’s comprehensive communications strategies (including visual/verbal identity, PR, advertising, sales visits etc.). The best companies speak with one voice, integrating the real and the virtual.

FUTURE-CASTS
Currently, most users access the web using a modem of limited speed. This is likely to change in the very near future. Thus, one future-cast is of a world with universal high-speed Internet access. In such a world, many of the current technological restrictions on Internet branding will no longer exist. Customers will be able to access video and audio information easily, and not only in the form of graphics-types “Flash” files. Rather, video paired with audio will be as common as in TV commercials. Picture and sound quality will drastically improve. Software that already exists for digital touch and smell can be put to use. As a result, the web will become much less text heavy and will provide a true multi-sensory experience.
Another future cast concerns mobile rather than stationery access. Most users today access the web via a stationary device (a desktop or laptop computer). In the near future, accessing the Internet via a handheld personal computing device (such as an electronic organiser, telephone, or watch), paired with GPS (general position systems) systems, will allow companies to send localised messages (e.g., when customers are in stores) and thus further broaden the experiential realm. At the same time, though, the interface (meaning a small screen compared to the typical laptop or desktop computer screen) will put limitations on the multi-sensory marketing that is likely to be the result of broadband. The challenge for designers and marketers then will be to design situation and customer specific sites for specific situations and customer needs.

SUMMARY
Creating a satisfactory on-line experience is not a pure technology issue; rather it is a design, marketing and management issue. In this article, I have provided a framework for managing the on-line experience. This framework details the key management factors relating to customers, site design and back-end support. To deliver a satisfactory on-line experience, the right web design is absolutely critical. But web design is more than graphic design. On the web, graphic design is product design is retail design. More than that. The web site is, at the same time, similar to and related to the cover of an annual report, an advertising spot, and a company’s point of sales. As such, the web site needs to be integrated with other forms of communications and image management tools. Most importantly, designers and managers need to be prepared for technologies such as broadband Internet access and access over mobile devices to transform the online experience very fast.

Notes
>Bill Gates (1999), Business at the Speed of Thought. NewYork: Warner.
>Tom Peters (1997), The Circle of Innovation: You Can’t Shrink Your Way to Greatness. New York: Knopf.
>Mary Modahl (2000), Now or Never: How
Companies Must Change Today to Win the Battle for Internet Consumers, New York: Harper.
>Bernd Schmitt (1999). Experiential Marketing: How to Get Customers to Sense, Feel, Think, Act and Relate to Your Company and Brands. New York: The Free Press.

Dr Bernd Schmitt is the father of Experiential Marketing, renowned brand consultant, a best-selling author, director of Center on Global Brand Management and professor at Columbia Business School, NY. He may be reached at Schmitt@imgyan.com.

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