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Hi, welcome back.
If you remember, in the last lecture we introduced the purchase funnel tool.
In this lecture, you will learn the concept of touchpoint.
You will need these two concepts to develop compelling customer experiences.
Think about if we were going to launch a rocket.
Our engineers would have developed the blueprints for it.
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These are the precise idea of how we want our rocket to be.
However, from blueprint to a tangible result, it is a long way and
it requires hard work.
Left of the screen you can see a simplified blueprint for
the Russian Soyuz rocket.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to imagine how much work it was actually
to build something that could successfully launch a space mission.
In a way, that is where we are with our brand.
We have a blueprint, now we need to build it.
So let's roll up your sleeves.
What are touchpoints?
Brand touchpoints are all the different ways that a brand interacts with, and
makes an impression on, the different stakeholders, such as consumers,
reviewers, analysts, etc.
To implement a brand, we use a touchpoint wheel.
Let's first work on the touchpoint concept by looking at Starbucks.
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Since a touchpoint is the point at which a customer touches or interacts with
the brand, it could be the actual coffee or the retail staff, called baristas.
Or perhaps the press articles about Starbucks.
But let me clarify that a touchpoint is not a quality, an attribute,
or a behavior, such as Starbucks fair trade or
friendliness of the staff, or even their environmental policy.
In order to design a customer experience,
we need to have a map of the potential touchpoints.
The touchpoint wheel looks like a gear.
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Think of it as the engine of an organization that drives every activity.
The example on the screen is taken from a company that makes and
sells industrial goods.
You have 20 seconds to memorize it.
No, I'm just teasing you.
I wanted to encourage you to pause the video and read through so
you realize how complex this task can be.
We separate three stages of brand customer interactions.
It starts with everything that happens before a customer makes the decision.
Things like advertising, trade shows, website and so on.
The next stage deals with interaction during the purchase decision.
In our example mostly interaction between sales people and customers.
Lastly, there are number of interactions after the purchase decision was made,
which includes service, billing and many more.
Each business has its own touchpoint wheel.
And depending on the nature of the offer, the three stages can have different names.
So how does a brand generate the customer experience at any given touchpoint?
Each touchpoint experience needs to be designed and
managed with the brand strategy in mind.
Think of the total different experience that you have when buying
one brand of car versus another.
Even when they are within the same price range.
In a touchpoint, there could be one or
more processes that customers get confronted with.
For example, take the service for our technical product.
Customers touch the brand during a phone call to make an appointment for
a service technician to come.
Then next touchpoint is when the service vehicle pulls up.
Then the technician himself is another touchpoint, and so on.
From this example we can see that on top of the actual process,
other factors are important in generate the touchpoint experience.
One of these factors is the tool that comes to play.
Just think of the automated phone system to schedule the service appointment.
Interacting with a computerized phone system is a very different
experience from talking to a person.
Which brings us to the most important aspect of defining touchpoints, people.
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They are ambassadors of our brand and
have a significant impact on our branding experience.
Eventually consistent brand building requires establishing
metrics to monitor and manage touchpoints.
But we will leave all of that for module six.
Let's talk about the different touchpoint categories.
Let's begin with the pre-purchase touchpoints,
which are those that drive a potential customer to place your brand
in their consideration sight prior to making the actual purchase.
I hope you're already realizing the connection between our purchase funnel
state disk and our touchpoint map.
Secondly, we talk about the purchase experience which comprises of all of
those touchpoints that are involved with a customer actually making the purchase,
up till the point when they have either received the product or service.
Also, we can include the touchpoints that are required or needed for
the customers to use the actual product or service.
Third, we have the post-purchase experience,
which are all of those touchpoints in leverage after the sale.
And after you have used your product or service and
serve to maximum your brand experience.
Lastly, we have other influencing touchpoints,
which are those are indirectly help to make an impression on the brand
on its customers and various stakeholders.
Now, if we think of our lemonade business,
which one do you think are the touchpoints?
Now that you have an understanding of the touchpoint concept,
let's identify the touchpoints for your brand.
I will be waiting to discuss it with you in our next lecture.
See you there. [MUSIC]
Ramon Diaz-BernardoAssociate Professor
