We see right through other people who are just out for themselves. We do the same when we come into contact with a business.
Whenever a potential customer interacts with a company, they are making a judgement about their experience. If they don’t feel respected as individuals, and if the exchange feels too one-way, they seek an alternative provider who caters to their needs more carefully.
For over 20 years, I’ve been helping top-tier companies deliver impactful user experiences by being more human-centred. What does this mean?
Most businesses see customers as data points. Numbers that either visit, browse, bounce, churn, buy, or repeat. They look at NPS scores, cost per acquisition, average order values, and customer lifetime value.
Businesses fixate on operational data and numbers. The trouble is, real people are not represented by data very well. Data leads to assumptions, and at worst, it can lead to de-humanisation. It’s much easier to make a decision that might harm user experience when you see numbers instead of real human beings.
I have conducted thousands of hours of customer research in my career. During the research, I would consistently hear distrust and disdain for corporations. When people came across a business that felt genuine, one that treated them like a real person instead of a potential sale, they got excited. The people I spoke to stayed on those websites longer and wanted to know more about these companies. Excitedly, they vowed to check them out after the user research session concluded.
A company that treated people like humans instead of a potential sale was refreshing.
Think about that for a minute. Businesses that treated people like real humans were the exception, not the norm. And as a result, people wanted to engage with them more.
Being easy to use and adding a few UX people to the team isn’t enough anymore. Companies need to change their entire culture to be more focused on the people they serve. Whether you call them users, customers, students, partners, employees, or guests. It doesn’t matter. They are all humans, and they all have real problems and real goals to reach. Your whole business must become more human-centred and go beyond the aim of delivering ‘good experiences’. Now is the time to push harder and aim bigger. Now is the time to aim for life-changing, mood-enhancing, community-engaging experiences.
More and more, customers are choosing brands with a heart and soul. Seeking companies actively trying to reduce carbon emissions, get rid of single-use plastic, or give back to society in some way. We seek out companies who treat their employees and customers with respect and honesty. We want to have great experiences and relationships with companies we can trust.
It won’t be long before some corporate giants come crashing down because they are too far removed from their customers. Focusing on profit instead of people and purpose is an old way of thinking. Time’s up. Now is the time to be more human-centred in every aspect of business. Now is the time to redesign companies to be more human at every point a customer interacts with them.
I am deeply passionate about helping companies who genuinely want to be more human. I have many years of experience in working with companies to deliver engaging and impactful user experiences. Now I want to go to the next level of experiences. Where genuinely unique and rewarding experiences create passionate fans and fulfilling relationships between companies and the humans they interact with.
Are you ready to change the way your employees and customers interact with your business?
