Closure experiences, part I.Why the end is one of the most important moments of the brand experience.

Everything has an end. Yet, the end of an experience or customer relationship is often overlooked by brands. This article is the first of two regarding the closure experiences. To learn more about great close experiences examples from the analog and digital world, check out «Closure experiences part II».

And now, let’s dive into a closure journey together to see why its absence is problematic and how its inclusion can improve the customer experience and benefit the organization with statistical analysis of questionnaire data.

Onboarding vs offboarding

These are turbulent times for brands. Vast sums are being spent on marketing, trying to attract new customers. Additional effort is made to ensure differentiation from the competition in order to win over new customers. The investment is meant to create credibility and relevance. Brands and businesses focus on designing user experiences for onboarding and the use of a product or service. Often they overlook the offboarding by neglecting the end. However, this is the only inevitable part of the journey.

In a world flooded with new apps, services and products, can we really assume that the design we’re working on won’t get lost in the evolutionary cycle of the next big thing?

A few examples to start with

Brands know their customers very well before they arrive through sophisticated and targeted advertising. Monitoring, research and digital behavioral data tell the company how the consumer is using the product. This data is used to create rich, emotional and engaging experiences at the beginning of the customer experience.

In contradiction, the ending of products, services and digital media is being overlooked. A vivid example of this is the experience of using ink cartridges. The onboarding and usage is extremely simple, orchestrated and designed to be easy. At the end of use they are forgotten and being thrown away.

These problems are not only a phenomenon of products from the analog world, though, but also take place in the digital world. Some platforms refuse to delete user accounts. When no results are found via a website’s search filter, the user is left alone at the dead end. Some e-commerce platforms have very sparse, if any, order summaries or thank you pages.

That’s a pity because endings are part of the Customer Journey and for most consumers, they are one of the most essential moments. To stick with the examples above: Customers nowadays will not buy coffee capsules because no proper ending was provided, and they just produce more waste.

Endings and ROI

Yet, most companies overlook the importance of a closure experience (Macleod, 2017). The current status quo believes that talking about the end of a product or service relationship will deter the sale.

Recent history however proves the exact opposite. Some of the most successful and fastest growing companies focused heavily on the ending and saw huge return on investment. The company KIA cars provides a profound example where the ending is heavily designed and discussed, even directly at the onboarding.

In 2007, KIA cars introduced the 7-year warranty, which is perceived as an end of product life. The majority of humans find it hard to project beyond 5 years into the future. Thus, KIA invited their customers to a predefined date when their car’s funeral will take place. According to COO of KIA Australia, Damien Meredith, “The major reason people buy our product now is the warranty. Price has slipped to third.”

Since the 7-year warranty was introduced, KIA’s market share has doubled. Snapchat first and bigger claim is “Delete is our default.” The numbers show that 35% of the users use it because their content disappears. Snapchat hit 191 million users in Q1 2018.

Positive endings trigger recommendations

A 2015 study showed that companies that have placed the entire customer journey at the center of their design process (leaders) vastly outperform those that do not (deniers). The study drew a clear picture with a share price increase of 108% in the last eight years, the leaders not only significantly outperformed the deniers’ holdouts with an increase of only 28%, but even outperformed the S&P 500 index. An index, which rose by only 72% over the same period.

The study also pointed out that when a company takes endings into account, its customers are more loyal and less price-sensitive. And these companies are more likely to receive a positive recommendation. Furthermore, customer journey leaders have lower advertising costs and, thanks to a lower complaint rate, need and have to spend fewer resources on service costs thanks to a lower complaint rate.

But why does the ending of an experience have such a strong impact? So much so that some users might decide to not even start the experience. To answer the question, let’s take a little detour into psychology and how our memories work.

The power of emotions

Some memories stay forever, especially if they are linked to strong emotions. A memory is nothing more than a group of neurons having a familiar conversation. Our emotions determine how we react to our environment.

Our experience is different from our memory, which means that our Experiencing Self is different from our Remembering Self, which only considers the peaks and the endings. When people make decisions, the Remembering Self is in control, and that is why the end of a Brand experience, Customer Experience or User Experience is so relevant to loyalty.

We learn from old brand experiences and transfer them to future events. When these memories are associated with emotions, they are called emotional markers. These emotional markers influence consumer behavior (Damasio, 2004). Emotions undoubtedly have an impact on people’s behavior and decisions (Pham, 2007).

Why endings matter

There is a saying that there is no second chance for a first impression. This would mean that we as designers should focus on the peaks of the experience. Experiences have it all. Users don’t always behave the way we want them to.

“There is a saying that there is no second chance for a first impression. This would mean that we as designers should focus on the peaks of the experience. Experiences have it all. Users don’t always behave the way we want them to.”

According to a questionnaire study that was conducted recently during my M.Sc., a large majority would recommend a brand that has a positive closure experience. Among those a large part would engage again with a brand that has a positive closure experience. Finally, an even larger one would not use a brand again if it had a negative closure experience.

As one can tell, the end can also act as a first impression, and any users remember brands that surprised them with a positive closure experience. On the other end of the study, very few users remember brands that offered discounts during the closure to motivate them to stay.

Conclusion

The end is psychologically one of the most impactful periods. People judge an experience largely by how they felt at its most intense moments and at the end, rather than by the total or average of each moment of the experience (Kahneman, 1990).

Endings have a significant impact on the brand experience I have just explained. So the Closure Experience influences loyalty to the brand and the company directly and indirectly.

Closure experience at dreipol

At dreipol we are aware that Closing Experiences are very important to strengthen customer loyalty. You can read what we recommend and how we can help you in our blog post “Closure experiences part II — How to design endings”.

Further reading, talks and links:

• Joe Macleod: «Ends: Why we overlook endings for humans, products, services and digital. And why we shouldn‘t » (Amazon)
• Jon Yablonski: «Peak-end rule» (Blog post)
• Joe Macleod: «Endineering: Designing consumption lifecycles that end as well as they begin.» (Amazon)

. . .
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References

Brakus, J. J. š., Schmitt, B. H. & Zarantonello, L. (2009). Brand Experience: What is It? How is it Measured? Does it Affect Loyalty? Journal of Marketing, 73(3), 52–68. https://doi.org/10.1509/jmkg.73.3.052

Becker, E. (1997). The Denial of Death (1. Aufl.). Free Press.

Damasio, A. R. (2004). Descartes’ Irrtum: Fühlen, Denken und das menschliche Gehirn. Ullstein Taschenbuchvlg.

Kahneman, D. (2021). Thinking, Fast and Slow (Later prt. Aufl.). Farrar Straus Giroux. 53

Kahneman, D., Fredrickson, B. L., Schreiber, C. A. & Redelmeier, D. A. (1993). When More Pain Is Preferred to Less: Adding a Better End. Psychological Science, 4(6), 401 — 405. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.1993.tb00589.x

Kasser, T. & Sheldon, K. M. (2000). Of Wealth and Death: Materialism, Mortality Salience, and Consumption Behavior. Psychological Science, 11(4), 348–351. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9280.00269

Pham, M. T. (2007). Emotion and Rationality: A Critical Review and Interpretation of Empirical Evidence. Review of General Psychology, 11(2), 155–178. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.11.2.155

Macleod, J. (2017). Ends.: Why we overlook endings for humans, products, services and digital. And why we shouldn’t. (1. Aufl.). Joe Macleod.