What we can learn from great movies
Behavioural economics suggests
that people judge events intuitively
by using two filters – the first is the
most intense moment of experience
and the second is the feeling you are
left with at the end. They call it the
Peak End Rule and one of the easiest
ways to understand how it works is to
think of it in the context of a classic
Hollywood movie plot structure.
The mid-point is where the greatest
danger, peril or pivotal moment
happens – a kind of intense ‘peak’.
Then, at the end of the movie there’s a
second emotive element at play – the
feeling you are left with as you walk
out of the cinema. Good movies, the
ones everyone remembers and talks
about, have both.
To bring the idea back into the
customer relationship world, rather
than being the sum of all experiences,
loyalty to a brand depends on the
positive memory of a critical few.
Behavioural economics also supports
the notion that in-the-moment
experiences and the memoires of this
experiences are not the same.
Daniel Kahneman, the eminent
psychologist who is notable for his
work on judgement and decision-
making puts it like this: “There is
a confusion about experience and
memory. We actually don’t choose
between experiences, we choose
between memories of experiences”
If this is true and some experiences
turn into memories while others
are forgotten forever, measuring
experiences is a first step but
we cannot stop there. It’s still
hugely important – transactional
research programmes fuel process
improvements and enable fast reaction
to dissatisfied customers - but it’s not
the whole story.
Predicting long-term customer
behaviour and providing future
strategic direction requires
relationship research, as the memories
76 MAL 19/17 ISSUE
‘‘ We set out to prove
that in-the-moment
experience is not the
same as the memory
of the experience at
a later point in time.
To put it another
way, the impact of a
particular experience
on a customer
decision months or
years later depends
on the memory of the
original experience
rather than the actual
experience itself.’’
of experiences are fundamental
in influencing customer decision-
making.
Our brains prioritise emotion
Neuroscience highlights that
memories help us to cope with
vast quantities of information. Our
brain is not a computer – it does
not just process the information
that it absorbs. Instead, it retrieves
the memories and tries to link the
current experience with them. But
even at that, if our brains worked
with memories alone there is still
too much data to process, so they
have developed an efficient way to
distinguish between relevant and non-
relevant information.
When an event is linked to an
emotion the brain tags it as relevant
and stores it for later use. If no
emotion is involved, our brains
classify it ‘non-relevant’ and consign
it to the forgotten file. If our brains
use emotions to organise and filter
information, we need to understand
what is behind those emotions
to decode the effect on customer
relationships.
Taking our idea out on the road
We tested our idea in a UK automotive
survey by studying the satisfaction car
owners felt after their latest workshop
visit and the effect on the overall
relationship with the car brand.
Our Key Performance Indicator for
measuring relationship strength is
the TRI*M index - built using two
components – company performance
and customer preference. Assessing
these two dimensions shows that the
car brands’ current success relies on
outstanding performance. But with
a low preference score the companies
have not yet secured future business
by translating its great performance
into customer propensity.
The emotional driver
Performance clearly does have an
effect – the better the performance,
the stronger the relationship.
So it’s important not to let your
customers down by performing below
expectation. But high performance
does not necessarily translate into
repeat business.
In our study, we explored two groups
of customers asking ‘How did you
feel about the workshop visit?’
with answer options ranging from
‘irritated’ to ‘delighted’.
Group one was not delighted by their
latest workshop visit, although they
assessed their experience as excellent.
Their verbatim answers were all very
functional – ‘prompt service’, ‘car now
runs well’, straightforward’. There
was no real hint of an outstanding
customer experience as such. This
group had a high performance score
but showed only an average preference
for their car brand.
The second group of customers were
those who felt delighted. They rated
the performance and preference
similarly high and gave us different
answers that had more to do with