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by: Dick Stroud
My favourite Web usability guru, Jakob Nielsen, has published a fascinating article about the impact of ageing on the way people use the Web. Do make sure you read the full article.
Continue reading " Middle-aged Users' Declining Web Performance" »
by: Karl Long
It's funny, I would suggest that Apple and Google probably have very different design processes and certainly a very different culture so what is the common denominator?
Continue reading "Apple, Google and Everyone Else - Who Owns the Customer Experience?" »
"Often times our first interaction with a brand is through a digital touch point like a site. Maybe we heard about it from a friend or somewhere else. We interact with it--we give it a try. If we like it--that leads to deeper levels of engagement. Maybe this repeats itself adding more "cycles" to the spiral. We continue to engage. Some of us even begin to participate. We transition from downloading to uploading our media. We talk about how great the experience is. To our peers, to each other. We become evangelists--the spiral actually expands as we engage with multiple touchpoints--not only the digital ones."
by: Ilya Vedrashko
Continue reading "Idea: Remote Control Jammer Chip Activated by Commercials" »
by: Eliane Alhadeff
Dr. Ernie Medina and his partners launched their first XRtainment Zone in California last year. The mission of XRtainment Zone is to provide families and kids of all ages a fitness club of their own "where working out is all play."
Continue reading "G4H 2008: XRtainment Zone - Beyond Serious Games For Workouts " »
by: danah boyd
Lots of folks are unaware that multiple brands are owned by the same company (e.g., the same company owns Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy). Consumer activists often complain that this practice is deceptive because it tricks consumers into believing that there are big distinctions between brands when, often, the differences are minimal. Personally, while I'd love to see more consumer brand awareness, but I think that brand distinctions play an important role. I just wish that the tech industry would figure this out.
Continue reading "one company, ten brands: lessons from retail for tech companies" »
by: Roger Dooley
One of the most annoying series of commercials is for HeadOn, an analgesic which one rubs on one's forehead to (supposedly) cure headaches. Does HeadOn work? I have no idea, but it seems doubtful.
by: David Polinchock
While readers of this blog will know that the ideas in this article are at the core of why the Brand Experience Lab exists, but it's always good to see other people thinking the same way. Especially when the author is with the Boston Consulting Group and yo know that this is coming from a business POV. I have excerpts here, but click on the link for the full article.
Here's a counter-intuitive thought: Shoppers with less information about a product are happier than those with more information. Researchers at the Tippie College of Business came to this conclusion after conducting a study in which people were asked their opinions of chocolate and hand lotion.
Continue reading "If You Want Customers to Be Happy, Give Them Less Product Information" »
by: Idris Mootee
We did a little shopping this weekend my wife and I stumbled upon a few good finds including a pair of Burberry snow boots and a pair of elegantly designed Tiffany sunglasses (with Swarovski crystals on the sides).
Continue reading "Tiffany - Extending the Brand Magic to New Categories?" »
By: Marina Natanova
In late January Apple conducted a big press-conference in
by: David Armano
As a self-proclaimed synthesizer, I'm always on the lookout for patterns. There were lots of them at Interaction 08 which just wrapped up over the weekend. The first pattern was the obvious--everyone there seemed to experience a type of "euphoria" which came from the realization of what they are.
by: Roger Dooley
Years ago, I worked with a group of field representatives selling industrial equipment, and found that many had interesting adaptations to local culture in different parts of the U.S. One based in Texas always kept a Western-cut sheepskin jacket in his car. If he was visiting a plant in a remote location, he'd shed the suit coat he wore in Dallas and put on the rugged-looking jacket.
by: Idris Mootee
We're playing with the new MacBook Air in the office today and we all appreciate what Apple put into this machine. Apple is no question a company that focuses not on its product, but on innovation.
Continue reading "Productivity and the Design + Usability Culture" »
Talking customer experience, here are my most recent stories:
Continue reading "Lenovo and Apple - The Tales of Two Customer Experience Stories" »
by: David Armano
While I still have great appreciation and admiration for the field of graphic design--the simple fact is that I have a tough time relating to many aspects of it. I haven't looked at an an issue of Communication Arts in years and AIGA becomes less relevant to me as digital media continues to evolve.
Continue reading "Subject to Change: Creating Great Products and Services for an Uncertain World" »
by: Eliane Alhadeff
Hilton Garden Inn, the award-winning mid-priced hotel brand with locations throughout North America and Europe, this week unveiled Ultimate Team Play - the first interactive training game to be used in the hospitality industry that utilizes game-based technology.
by: David Polinchock
Thanks to copyranter
for the tip on this piece. Wow, 44% of people surveyed don't believe anything a company says! If ever there was a reason to understand the value of compelling, authentic and relevant brand experiences, this could be it! If this many people don't believe what you say, you better give them a good reason to believe what you do! There's not an industry on the list that cracks 40% trust and that's pretty sad. Some interesting numbers:
Continue reading "Polls: 44% Normally Disbelieve Any And All Company Statements" »
by: David Polinchock
You know, there are many companies that we would all expect to respond like this, but Target isn't among them. I'm with David Burns from Adpulp on this one. Companies have to work much harder then this if they want to not wind up as fodder for the blog world -- and the MSM.
Continue reading "Target Doesn't Engage With Non-Traditional Media - AdPulp" »
by: Yann Gourvennec
Very often, I hear people say that you have to make your end-user’s lives easier to generate a marketing success. However paved with good intentions this statement may be, I did ask myself the question whether making users’ live easier is a sustainable marketing argument for the development of a business.
Continue reading "Is User-friendliness a Sure Marketing Bet?" »
by: Roger Dooley
Brain studies are providing lots of new insights into consumer behavior, but this post recognizes a new and important role for marketing based on neuroscience research. If you are an occasional Neuromarketing reader (or grazer!), this is one post that you may want to bookmark.
by: David Armano
Meet David Lee King. David's a librarian. David's interested in transforming the library experience. He's also interested in Experience Design—specifically, Digital Experience Design.
Continue reading "Digital Experience Design + A New Book From David Lee King" »
Continue reading "Phone quest, or Please be less creative" »
I
had just finished giving a talk about youth culture to a room full of
professionals who worked in the retail industry when a woman raised her
hand to tell me a story. It was homecoming season and her daughter Mary
was going to go to homecoming for the first time. What fascinated this
mother was that her daughter's approach to shopping was completely
different than her own.Continue reading "Technology and the World of Consumption" »
Continue reading ""Spamturitis" and Facebook's Signal to Noise Factor" »
Continue reading "Cosmetic Neurology: Brain-Boosting Drugs" »
At my old agency we used to sometimes talk about “the immunised
consumer”. The point we were trying to make was that the practice of ad
avoidance isn’t just to do with tools that people employ to block out
ads - be it the fast-forward button on a DVR, pop-up blocker, etc. Continue reading "Consumers treat advertising like trains" »
Continue reading "New Year's top resolution: Managing your online reputation!" »
Update:
I'm having a real-time Twitter conversation with Adweek's Brian Morrissey who, as an avid runner is not a fan of the site and offers this opinion:
"the content is one-size-fits-all lame, the redirect to forums sucks out loud and it's still nike talking at me."
Continue reading "All I Want for X-MAS is a Better X-perience" »
I've been struggling through the new book “Authenticity” by Joseph Pine and James Gilmore,
and I've been wondering why I've struggled. It's not a badly-written
book, and I remember reading and liking some articles adapted from
their earlier book, “The Experience Economy.”
I'm also interested in the idea of authenticity (link to prior post).
But nonetheless, I've read the book in fits and starts. It's been a
chore.by: Eliane Alhadeff (also see Business & Games)
By 2010, says Gartner, 20% of global Tier 1 retailers will have some kind of marketing presence in online games and virtual worlds.
