Archives / November 2004

A few months ago I wrote one of the most popular Good Experience columns ever: Budgeting for Advertising and the Customer Experience [1]. In it, I quoted Amazon.com's CEO, Jeff Bezos, stating that Amazon invests in customer experience, not advertising, to generate word-of-mouth and grow revenues.

I also asked why one potential client I talked to would spend $30 million per year on advertising, yet only $20,000 on improving the experience that customers have when they get to the website.

Just this week I received in my inbox a continuation of those thoughts - from none other than Jeff Bezos. Quoted by David Kirkpatrick in Fast Forward [2], Bezos spoke in New York about how word-of-mouth works:

"Word of mouth is becoming more powerful," [Bezos] said. "If you offer a great service people find out about it..." He predicted that for all businesses, the amount of money spent on marketing and advertising will decline while the amount spent developing better products or services will increase as a result. "If the successful recipe [today] is spending 70% of your money shouting about your service and 30% producing a better service, over the next 20 years that will reverse."

My first thought on reading those words: This is going to get really interesting, really fast. Advertising won't go away, but investments in customer experience are going to grow MUCH bigger.

This makes perfect sense. The spread of Internet connectivity worldwide makes it much easier for people to communicate with each other about experiences they've had - commercial or not - specifically, whether they're good or not. A good experience will spread via the ether of the Internet, powered by millions of thumbs and fingers, typing and e-mailing and texting and IMing the referrals to friends all across the world. (I don't need to tell you that a bad experience will spread the same way - maybe even faster.)

Oh, and advertising might help a little bit on the side, too.

Of course I'm being provocative. None of this will change overnight; advertising will remain an important industry, and ads will still work to expose new products and services. But you heard Mr. Bezos: the amount spent developing better products - some would call it "creating good" - will become the main attraction.

Which brings me to my question for you - or more likely for your coworkers, your entire company. To paraphrase a famous quote [3],..

Do you want to spend the rest of your career selling sugar water, or do you want to change the world?

I'll put it another way: Customer experience is the defining success factor in business for the next twenty years. Learning from customers, creating the experience they want, measuring the success of what you do, continually fine-tuning the service and returning to customers to learn more - this now must be the primary mission of any business that has customers. If you create a great customer experience, you'll almost certainly win.

Oh, and again, advertising might help a little bit on the side, too.

The other thing I take away from Bezos's comments is that we're so very early in this process. As much as companies are beginning to make changes - forming new groups, starting new customer-centered projects - these are just the prelude to what could be the biggest general change to business we've seen in our lives. Thousands of companies, shifting to a customer-centered strategy - not because some flavor-of-the-week consultant told them to, but because customers forced them to - will make for some interesting times.

But most importantly: what role will you play?

- - -

[1] Budgeting for Advertising and Customer Experience

[2] Fast Forward newsletter, by David Kirkpatrick, 11/11/04. It's a good newsletter, but it doesn't seem to contain the signup address.

[3] This is roughly what Steve Jobs reputedly asked John Sculley in the early 1980s when Jobs recruited Sculley to Apple Computer.

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Job Opening: Yahoo! Inc.
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Company: Yahoo! Inc.
Title: VP, User Experience Design
Location: Sunnyvale, CA

The successful candidate will be charged with directing Yahoo's
global UED efforts, initiatives, and people. This individual will
be charged with crafting and driving the global strategy inclusive
of creative as well as operations. He/She will interface with Yahoo
senior executives, etc., in formulating product strategy

Please send resumes to careers@yahoo-inc.com, req#RX0400004655

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Job Opening: Adobe Systems
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Company: Adobe Systems
Title: Visual Design Lead
Location: San Jose, CA

We are seeking a Visual Design Lead for Adobe's Common UI. This
person will collaborate closely with the Visual Design Leads, who
own the visual style and strategy for their respective segments, as
well as the broader UI Team and the product teams.

Please email your resume&portfolio to Heidi.Collins@adobe.com

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Job Opening: Offermatica
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Company: Offermatica
Title: Client Marketing Analyst
Location: San Francisco

Help compaines like Restoration Hardware and Petco increase their
online conversions. Offermatica is an ASP A/B, multivariate testing
and automated product suggestion solution.
For more details please look at:
http://www.offermatica.com/jobs/Client_Marketing_Analyst.html

Please contact rkizer@offermatica.com to learn more

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Job Opening: A&E Television Networks (A&E and The History Channel)
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Company: A&E Television Networks (A&E and The History Channel)
Title: Technical Operations and Usability Manager, E-Commerce
Location: Stamford, CT

Responsible for maintaining day-to-day ops for AETN's online stores;
project manage and implement functionality and customer experience
enhancements that drive revenue and increase customer satisfaction.
Highly collaborative work environment. Must be an excellent
problem-solver and be able to bridge marketing & IT.

To apply, please send your resume to soyoung.park@aetn.com.

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Job Opening: Waterfront Media
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Company: Waterfront Media
Title: Product Manager
Location: Brooklyn, New York

The Product Manager works with an editorial team to create
compelling health community sites that offer an outstanding customer
experience while maximizing the lifetime value of subscribers.
Required: ability to write detailed functional specifications and at
least 4 yrs experience producing online media.

E-mail resume to jobs@waterfrontmedia.com