Customers are better informed than ever before — expectations are high and loyalty is rare. How customers feel about a product, service or business can drastically alter their engagement with and behaviour toward a company and influence the likelihood of them being loyal.

This rapidly evolving landscape has left leaders at a loss, and what we are experiencing is likely the beginning of a tectonic shift in the way digital channels are designed, monitored and managed. Companies need new forms of knowledge and processes that allow them to create lasting engagements with their customers.

In this chapter, we present useful concepts for clarifying and refining the emotional meaning behind an organisation’s strategy, and its relationship to corresponding digital channels. Through examples we discuss the process and impact of ‘emotionally aware’ digital channel designs. We also make recommendations on how to select, design and maintain digital engagements based on your strategy as well as industry needs.

LOYALTY IS A RARITY

Consumers are no longer loyal. However, some customers may be loyal to the engagement experience (digital stimulus) that one particular brand offers over another. Consumers gravitate toward experiences that provide them with the emotional engagement they are searching for. Once the experiential elements of the engagement disappear, in many cases so does the emotional connection consumers have with the company that was providing them.

We have less recreational time than ever before, so naturally we are guarded about how we spend it and what inspires us to do so. If a company focuses on trying to sell consumers their products or services rather than finding creative ways to engage with them through their down time, their brand will be short-lived.

Speaking of cultivating loyalty, Kmart managed to do exactly this in a marketplace full of tight retail competition. In Australia only eight years ago it was difficult to imagine that Kmart could or would ever be classified as stylish, modern or trendy — and yet currently they are being admired as just that. Back in 2008 Kmart were lagging behind more profitable rivals such as Big W and Target and, although the retail giant had a turnover of AU$4 billion a year, zero of it was profit. They sat close to bankruptcy for years, until finally a new chief executive was brought in to resuscitate the organisation. Over the span of six years they went from zero profit to AU$289 million earnings before interest and taxes at the close of 2014. Since then, Kmart have gone from strength, to strength posting even greater profits more recently, and they have avoided bankruptcy, becoming the most profitable retailer in Australia.

The company had many issues prior, including a bloated business model with no concise strategy, an overpopulated product stock list and confusing pricing structures. The rebranding Kmart underwent was not superficial; it was a complete strategic transformation. Kmart unreservedly embraced change to become Australia’s top homeware and fashion retailer, and they did so with the captivating recipe of on-trend products at simple low prices.

Recent times have seen the brand enjoy considerable social media attention, and astonishingly, most of it is organic. With thousands of Australian customers following countless unofficial Kmart fan accounts and sharing their purchases and personal style, the ‘Cult of Kmart’ has dominated Facebook and Instagram. Hashtags such as #kmarthack, #kmartstyling, #kmartaddictsunite and #kmartswag have an enthusiastic online following, instantaneously creating a bonded community and establishing Kmart as an aspirational brand (for more on the community digital channel typology, see chapter 3).

The idea behind the ‘Kmart hack’ (see figure 5.1) is to first purchase items from Kmart, and then to re-create different products by painting, gluing and all-round re-purposing (as demonstrated by using a basket for a coffee table) afterwards and then posting it online and sharing it with the Kmart hacker community. There are a number of social media pages devoted to these hacks, and large numbers of Australian customers that share their own hacks and DIY makeovers utilising Kmart products.

Thousands of penny-saving mums are posting images of their purchases (before and after ‘hack’ shots), tagging their wish lists and sharing mood boards of products and home décor advice. The growth in popularity has been organic and not coordinated by head office, with customers creating their own vast communities to immediately share their opinions and like other members’ creations. In this case it worked in Kmart’s favour, but as you will see in other examples shortly, this does not always yield positive results for the company.

DECONSTRUCTING THE DIGITAL AFFECT FRAMEWORK

As discussed throughout this book, the process of creating an emotional experience is complex and involves many different factors. Emotions are functional because they pull us towards certain people, objects, actions and ideas, and push us away from others. Pleasant emotions pull us to products that are (or promise to be) constructive, whereas unpleasant emotions will push us from those that are (or promise to be) detrimental to our wellbeing. Customer loyalty can only be developed if a company can build emotional connections in addition to positive attitudes and behaviours. Positive memorable experiences with a company are key to creating emotionally loyal customers.

Traditional market research cannot anticipate quick shifts in customer preferences, tastes, habits and lifestyles, so companies need to be engaged with their customers on a deeper level to understand not what they want but why they want it.

The field of design and emotion has various tools and methods for understanding customers’ needs, aspirations and feelings through predominantly asking ‘why’ questions. This empathic approach places emphasis on understanding the emotional aspects of a customer–product or customer–company relationship. Companies should be delving deeper by questioning customers and inviting them to interact, rather than simply reacting to questions and instructions. By replacing the passive view of a customer with an active one, organisations can gain new insights and opportunities to design interactive and valuable digital channel engagements. See the Burberry case study for a great example of this kind of engagement.

The Digital Affect Framework (see figure 5.2) collectively brings together the elements explored in the previous chapters. When used holistically it outlines the steps required for an organisation to become emotionally aware and inform its strategy with a deeper understanding of its customers.

The Digital Affect Framework illustrates that cognition (what we think), emotion (what we feel) and behaviour (what we do) are related and influence each other (as outlined in chapter 2). Analysing different customer affective states is important, as they create the emotional experience of interaction with the company, which contributes to the meaning and emotional response.

Inputs such as a company’s value proposition and the digital hedonic rhetoric (outlined in chapter 4) create perceptions of the company through the messages and the digital stimulus (outlined in chapter 3) it puts out. These two parts (the inputs and outputs) are key in understanding the relationship formed between customer and company. Not only is it important for future planning, but it is required for determining how a strong relationship can be built over time.

A company must plan its digital channel strategy by first understanding the critical, important and impartial requirements of digital channel usage. This stage of planning requires exploring the company’s current use of digital touchpoints and what the industry digital channel standards and requirements are. This understanding is important in designing digital channels because it helps ensure that customer needs will be met through the digital engagement.

By starting with people, companies can uncover individual customer emotional needs, and in turn understand how to design for their needs. Putting customer emotions at the centre of a company’s business strategy strengthens relationships, providing innovative digital channel design opportunities. It is important to note that the process should start with the customer and not an existing solution or digital channel.

This chapter is approaching the same end state, but from an organisation’s point of view so that the two (the organisation and the customer) align simultaneously through their values and convert into an emotional experience. From this, organisations can design the right digital channel strategy for their needs by understanding their own affective state, the requirements of the industry and customer content needs. It is through values that individuals feel connected and emotionally committed to a company, so it is essential that values match. As value gives meaning, and meaning is heavily intertwined with emotion.

This framework is presented in appendix B in a template format to encourage you to experiment. The following sections outline the three components of the framework:

1. understanding your industry
2. understanding your customer
3. understanding your digital engagements.

Value proposition: Understanding your industry

Deciphering a company’s value internally can be more difficult for some than others, as this may not be known across all areas of a company or indeed within the management team (as some of our industry projects have shown). Therefore, it may require work to first get to the core value of why the business exists in the first place. Who do they serve? An analysis of the company strategy may be required to get to the emotional drivers. Once the company value is known, it can be converted into an emotional experience for the customer. The desired affective state and the eliciting condition (digital hedonic rhetoric) underpin the meaning behind the company’s strategy, and they should align with how the company wants their customers to feel every time they engage with them. This is discussed in chapters 2 and 4.

It is important for organisations to also continually look outward at the industry as a whole, to gain insights into changes from potential disruptors (such as Airbnb to the hotel industry and Uber to the taxi industry) and also for new perspectives, such as Cj Hendry seeing art as a potentially profitable business. Is the value for an industry in a state of change? For example airports, traditionally designed to service airlines, becoming a hub for passengers’ travel experiences, and a destination in themselves.

Key questions to ask to understand your company’s value and the state of play of the industry include:

• What is the current state of business models in the industry?
• Where is the industry heading? Are there any potential disruptors?
• What is the value that other companies offer in your industry? Are they all similar?
• Do you think their value offering is going to change?
• What is your value offering? Is this the same as others in your industry?
• How is your value communicated to your customers?
• Do you think your customer aligns with your values?

Value proposition checklist:

• Make sure everyone in the company understands and knows the value offering.
• Don’t conflict with any parent or partner company’s values.
• Redesign the company’s value if it’s no longer relevant.

Digital hedonic rhetoric: Understanding your customer

Digital hedonic rhetoric starts and ends with understanding your customers and how they interact in the digital world. This process aims to create an understanding of why customers engage in the digital world, to inform how you should interact with them in their world. This requires knowing what their daily habits and behaviours are, and building your digital strategy upon these behaviours. You may be looking at the wrong problems or issues; start by asking your customers what they believe be their biggest problems are.

In order to provide customers with positive experiences, the underlying meaning of these experiences must be understood in considerable depth. Customer meaning is explored in the same way a company’s is: through identifying desired affective states and their eliciting conditions. The interaction between a company and customer is a blend of the company’s physical performance, the associations it stimulates and the emotions it evokes, measured against the customer’s expectations across all moments of contact. A customer’s expectations are essential, so it is necessary to first understand their associated feelings, emotions, moods and experiences in relation to the company.

Customer needs relate to the type of interaction the customer wants. What feelings, emotions and moods are evoked through their interaction with a company? Digital channels should be designed to evoke positive responses, satisfaction and pleasurable experiences over a period of time.

To gain this understanding, we need to gather data relating to:

• the individual customer
• their current awareness and use of company digital channels
• the emotions being experienced by the customer when interacting with the company and the reasons behind these emotions.

The main intent of this is to decipher why customers experience certain emotions, and to establish a link between the experience (attributes), their response (consequences) and related personal values.

Digital channels must be well publicised and perceived as useful and user-friendly by customers, otherwise they are unlikely to use them. Customers who are aware of available digital channels have a higher rate of pleasant experiences. Our research has indicated that perceived usability, loyalty, trust and satisfaction are interrelated, as these indicators increased when a customer’s expectations of the system were confirmed.

Key questions to ask to understand your customer include:

• Who is your customer?
• Should they be your customer?
• What do they value?
• What are their perceptions of the company?
• Do your customer’s values align with what you are offering?
• Why does the customer value this?

Digital hedonic rhetoric checklist:

• Have a conversation with your customers. Don’t simply ask if they like or dislike something; ask them what they value and why.

Digital stimulus: Understanding your digital engagements

Digital stimulus is more than just posting content on a channel; it is a way to communicate your company’s value and provide memorable experiences. This should start with designing an experience that you want your customer to have with your company. Once you identify your desired experience and emotions, this can help you select the right channels or, if they don’t yet exist, design a new one. Design the digital channel to bridge the gap between the digital and physical experience with the company or products (or in some cases bridge back to other digital channels), however always keep in mind that the emotions evoked should align with the core values, providing a seamless experience. (This also involves understanding when to be bold with engagements and when to be subtle. For example, when customers only require basic information, a functional channel is usually the best solution.) Consistency of messages should expand to all aspects of the company, including campaigns, ensuring that they are designed together even if executed separately or over a number of channels.

The quality of an interaction with a company via its digital channels will have an impact on customers’ behaviour and motivations to engage with the company again. Memorable positive experiences lead to positive behaviours and loyalty towards the company.

In the concept of ‘progression of economic value’, experiences are a new economic offering (after commodities, goods and services).² Experiences are a new lever for providing value to both the company and the customer. From this perspective, companies do not sell experiences, but rather they provide products and contexts that can be employed by customers to co-create their own unique experiences. Customer experience is made up of physical and emotional elements and is not about the delivery of the product or service, but how it made them feel.

Emotions affect attitudes and behaviours towards companies, as well as the economic value of long-term customer relationships. Positive experiences result in comfortable and relaxed customers, which in turn leads to repeat business, higher spending rates and ultimately increased revenues. Therefore, providing customers with pleasant experiences through the awareness and use of digital channels is paramount. And keep in mind: it is not only about the channel but about how people use it — and if they will use it at all!

Key questions to ask to understand your digital engagements include:

• What channels does the industry traditionally currently use?
• Are customers engaging with these channels? If so, how are they engaging?
• What are they saying?
• What is the purpose of your existing channels?
• Do your current digital channels match the needs of your customers?
• What value does the channel bring the user and the company?

Digital stimulus checklist:

• Decide on a distinct visceral aesthetic style that represents the value proposition and branding.
• If the perfect channel doesn’t exist, make your own.
• Push technological boundaries — do something unique with the existing technology of the channel.
• Benchmark other digital strategies and channels in the same industries.
• Look to other industries to inspire your digital channel selection and experience.

Think before you post

Once you understand your value proposition, digital hedonic rhetoric and digital stimulus and start to craft your approach, keep this checklist in mind before posting:

• Remember the message to your customers about the company’s value.
• What have your previous messages said about your company?
• Have a deliberate plan: understand the emotion you want to elicit.
• What emotion will this elicit? Is it aligned with the value proposition?
• How does what I’m stating in this post reinforce the emotion/digital hedonic rhetoric of the company?
• Does it match the style of the channel?
• Does it play to the strengths of that channel? (e.g. pictures for Instagram)
• Do the images and text align?
• Understand the use of text, such as hashtags, remembering consistency and nuances, and potential misunderstandings.
• Does it align with the visceral aesthetic style of the brand?

EXAMPLES OF ALIGNING VALUES TO EXPERIENCES

As stated before, in order to provide customers with experiences, the underlying emotions they have about the company must first be understood. An emotional commitment develops when the customer identifies with the values of a company and the emotional drivers behind its strategy. The importance of a sense of meaning is heavily explored in the field of design and emotion, as the customer mindset is a key driver of company performance.

However, with the growing number of channels, companies are faced with the challenge of unifying their online value across multiple channels and engaging with customers in a way that is not only consistent and true to their company value, but also that engages customers in their sense of meaning. Since customers can engage and share their own content, they are empowered to express and publish positive and negative experiences with or without the company’s permission, so mistakes can have a huge impact on a company’s reputation. On the other hand, these new digital channels combined with increasing levels of digital literacy also allow organisations to embed customers as co-designers and co-producers of company value and meaning, like in the Kmart example earlier in this chapter.

As initially discussed in chapter 1, the digital Kate Spade storefront, which integrates online shopping with a real-world environment, aims to evoke desired emotions that reflect the brand’s identity and their ‘Saturday Girl’ (figure 5.3), their ideal customer. When designing this digital engagement, they understood the negatives to purchasing clothing online, such as not knowing the right size and the item not arriving on time. To create a positive experience, multiple sizes can be ordered, as a Kate Spade courier politely waits for the customer to try on multiple sizes and only takes payment on the items the customer wishes to purchase.

Through the use of mobile technology, they were able to use the benefits of digital shopping (such as 24-hour access) and place it into the physical world. The use of technology here is to make the storefront less about selling and more about creating an experience, giving shoppers a reason to engage with the company. See figure 5.4 for the Digital Affect Framework of Kate Spade’s ‘Saturday Girl’.

As discussed in chapter 1, Meat Pack’s ‘Hijack’ campaign ‘stole’ customers from their competitors (see figure 5.5, overleaf).

The experience of using the mobile application was undoubtedly fun and memorable and more effective than a traditional discount voucher, resulting in a significant behaviour change (running from a competitor’s store). The long-term effects on behaviour are seen in the engagement via other digital channels such as Facebook, which have helped promote the store through positive engagements. See figure 5.6 (overleaf) for the Digital Affect Framework for Hijack.

This, along with Kmart’s authentic community of followers who take it upon themselves to promote and share in their online community, is the stuff that social media managers dream of. See figure 5.7 (see p146) for the Digital Affect Framework for Kmart’s ‘hacks’.

US-based company American Apparel provides us with an example of the huge impact a mistake can have. Three decades ago in 1986, the tragic explosion of the space shuttle Challenger (which killed all seven astronauts on board) just 73 seconds after lift-off provided one of the most distressing images of the late twentieth century. Fast forward to 2014. This image was used by American Apparel — for their Fourth of July festivities. American Apparel’s social media team uploaded the image of the disintegrating shuttle to the brand’s Tumblr blog, tagging the image ‘smoke’ and ‘clouds’. As outraged customers and members of the public reacted all over social media the company quickly apologised and took the image down. ‘We deeply apologize for today’s Tumblr post … The image was re-blogged in error by one of our international social media employees who was born after the tragedy and was unaware of the event’, the company said on Twitter. However, the apology did not stop the viral spread of disdain for the company. This highly visible customer relationship is created online and can, as this example shows, be nearly impossible to reverse once the damage is done.

AFFECTED PRINCIPLES

For companies to build awareness of different innovation strategies, tools and processes, as well as adopt and embed these approaches within their organisation, it requires not only a strong Fox manager but also Foxes at all levels of the business. This demands not only strong leadership but also an inquisitive company culture, allowing for the participation of customers in co-creating brand identity. Companies can strategically use this involvement to inform and strengthen their relationships with customers.

This chapter has demonstrated that in order to execute an affected strategy, it will need to be bigger than the design of one digital channel. It goes back to the roots of your company and the strategic values it holds. By understanding and agreeing on this, the rest of the Digital Affect Framework can be designed and implemented successfully. To ensure the alignment of values to experience, we have created the following ‘principles of affect’, which should be used to guide all digital engagements with customers. They are as follows:

• Like all great design, less is more.
• If you created it, you need to maintain it.
• Don’t follow the trend.
• Alignment is crucial.
• Your customers are your greatest asset.
• We might not remember the details, but we will remember how it made us feel.

These are to be used in conjunction with the Digital Affect Framework seen in Appendix B.

Like all great design, less is more.

Remember it is better to have fewer channels that provide true value to your customers than to have many channels that are inactive. Likewise, it is better to have a small amount of well-designed content on some channels than to have masses of posts that mean nothing. You also have to respond to and engage with the audience of your channel and the content that you provide in it. Take your time and craft something meaningful. Quality over quantity is always the key.

Don’t forget: Be considered and consistent.

If you created it, you need to maintain it.

There is nothing worse than searching for a company and clicking on a social media site only to find out that it has been inactive for months or even years. Remember the Heinz sauce bottle example and the German porn site? Maintain your domain hosting! Consider that all representations of the company will influence a customer’s perspective and have an impact on their experience. If you are smart about it, you can even leverage this information to inform your own future content.

Don’t forget: If it’s online, it will be seen.

Don’t follow the trend.

Don’t copy and paste. What Just because it works for one company, it doesn’t mean it will work for you, as shown in a few examples in this book. However, we encourage taking inspiration from industries other than your own. Umpqua Bank did this well: they looked outside banking to Starbucks to craft their unique customer experience. Exploring how other companies are engaging with customers could provide inspiration and exciting unique offerings that your competitors have not thought about yet.

Don’t forget: Standing out is better than fitting in.

Alignment is crucial.

Design the emotional customer experience your company wants to project. Then for the digital strategy, select the right channels and then create the context. Carefully craft posts in a complete manner first before anything is uploaded. The entire channel should be designed as an emotional experience for the audience, as shown in the five-prong ‘Burberry Love’ case study. If a new campaign is being launched, design the whole experience from the beginning, questioning what the overall goals are. (And, importantly: these should expand far beyond profits.)

Don’t forget: View engagements as holistic experiences.

Your customers are your greatest asset.

Without them you have no reason to exist, so bring the audience along on the journey. Look at the how and, more importantly, understand why customers are responding to messages. Use the information the audience posts and the questions they ask to better understand what it is they are responding to and why. This is a great way to gain insights into what they value. Use the posts strategically to prototype early ideas with customers.

Don’t forget: The customer!

We might not remember the details, but we will remember how it made us feel.

Like most disagreements or fights, we may not remember what was specifically said, but we will remember how it made us feel. Everything you do say and post should reinforce the core affect you want to create, the reason your company does what it does and the values that you represent. Through this clear, concise and compounded affect customers will truly remember your brand.

Never forget: Affect.

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Keep these principles in mind as you move on to the following case study and to chapter 6, where we discuss digital strategy in the real world.