Cherish Every Experience

One of the things that I think has been the biggest driver for my business growth over the past three to four years has been nothing to do with what I do in my business day to day.

It is with being obsessively curious about my own consumer experiences.

Recently I started in a new gym and was so hyper conscious of everything from the onboarding emails I got, to the explanation as to how the 24 hour front door works - to even little things like the lack of a sign telling you whether the door at the end of the corridor leads to the middle of the gym, a changing room or is just a locked door (this indecision is enough to stop people using huge amounts of space sometimes, for fear of looking silly)

I think one of the best things that a coach can do is focus on their experiences, and then take what they like or what they don’t like and apply it to their own business.

Think about your own gym experience.

Was there someone waiting for you on the desk on day one or do you just get a code or a fob and left to crack on.

At your local coffee shop, do the people remember what your coffee order is, if you go there a lot? How do they position the bakery items and are they doing it in a way that makes you more likely to buy one than the other?

Last time you had to make a complaint to a company and ask them to replace an appliance, what was their customer service like?

Are there software companies you’ve struggled to get a refund out of, even though you canceled pretty much immediately.

I think we always remember and notice businesses who have an edge in these areas, and then we go and run our own business like a very average middle ground

Which is fine - no one’s complaining but no one’s delighted by the way the service is delivered.

And we put everything to programmes, plans, check-ins, training blocks, macros, but nobody experiences their programmes or their information in isolation.

Clients notice all of this stuff, but they also experience the gap between when they pay and when they start.

The first week, when they don’t really know what normal looks like yet. An awkward message when they want to try and pause a conversation about refunds. The way you handle it when you get something wrong. The way that they leave.

Those are the moments with the most feeling attached to them, and they’re almost always the least designed part of a coaching business.

Which is mad, because they’re the ones people tell other people about.

Nobody has ever gone to the pub and said ‘the periodisation was excellent’. They say ‘he was brilliant when my mum was ill and I had to stop for a month’.

You don’t need to invent any of this, because you’re a customer everywhere.

So go and pay attention to it deliberately for a week. Every time a business makes you feel looked after, or makes you feel like a nuisance, work out exactly which touchpoint did it - and then go and find the same touchpoint in your own business.