Spoiler alert! If you haven’t ridden the new Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance ride at Galaxy’s Edge in Disney World, turn back before it’s too late. In this blog, we talk about the importance of customer experience and how it can help your business. We use Rise of the Resistance as an example of how Disney crafted a unique and memorable experience for their customers.

If you haven’t ridden Rise of the Resistance yet, skip ahead to the heading “Getting creative with customer events” so you can still learn about creating a fantastic experience for your customers. 

Ready? Punch it, Chewie! 

A truly unique Star Wars experience

It’s hard to describe Rise of the Resistance as a “ride.” It really is a one-of-a-kind Disney experience that you won’t forget. If you’re not bothered by spoilers or you’re curious what it’s like, keep reading! Otherwise, skip to the next section. It’s your last chance.

As you can expect with any Disney ride, you move through a long outdoors/indoors line to get to the first room. Adorable droid BB-8 is on a pedestal next to a hologram of Rey, who tells you about the mission you’re about to go on. A hologram. It looks so cool.

You leave the room and enter a giant ship waiting outside. After it launches, the Empire begins attacking. Suddenly, the doors that you used to enter open again, and you realize the Empire has boarded your ship. That means the ship has actually moved, and you’re in a totally different place to continue the experience. 

Stormtroopers escort you to the next location, all the while interrogating you and treating you as a rebel spy. You really feel like a character in the story. We won’t completely spoil how the ride ends, but suffice it to say that the Resistance helps you escape in a small ship with an amazing Tower of Terror-esque free fall.

If you get the opportunity to try Rise of the Resistance safely at Disney World, we highly recommend it. It’s so worth your time, even if you’re a casual Star Wars fan or not one at all! The immersive experience and attention to detail can make you think differently about the experience you create for your own customers through your business.

Getting creative with customer events

As you all know by now, we changed our Pixie Dust & Profits live experience in August 2020 to an online event because of the pandemic. We wanted to make sure all of our attendees felt safe. 

Every detail, from the course curriculum to custom gifts to in person events, had to be rethought or shelved after almost two years of planning. When you put that much detail in a face-to-face event and bring it online, you have to consider how to shift the experience so you can still surprise and delight your customers. You can still give them their money’s worth.

First, we ditched the traditional Facebook group mastermind model that’s so popular now and instead used a platform called Mighty Networks to gather attendees. Mighty Networks has a lot of great features, like live chat rooms and open office hours and transcripts of discussions. It was a more personable platform that created the close-knit community feel that we wanted.

Next, we extended the program from four days to the entire month of August. We knew that many of our attendees, like us, were juggling a lot of responsibilities at home already. Four days wasn’t going to cut it. By stretching the program over a month, we allowed people time and space to dive deeper into their work without feeling rushed.

Lastly, we thought of ways we could mail our attendees gifts and items that we had planned on giving them in person. Keeping those “surprise and delight” moments for our attendees was really important to us.  

Think of ways to spruce up customer touch points

Even if you don’t have a big in person or online event coming up, there are lots of ways you can make the customer experience special. Look at a customer’s entire journey with your business and find various touch points that you can spruce up.

For example, if someone just bought a product from you, you know that they’ll be on the lookout for an email confirming their order. What does your email say? Is it the standard “thanks for buying” message with all the basic details? Or do you have a creative, on-brand message that goes the extra mile to make your customer feel special? What about the confirmation page they see immediately after their order is placed?

You can do the same when you ship orders to your customers, too. We’re not suggesting you buy extra gifts or spend too much time customizing every order, because that can take a lot of energy and resources. But think of a way to make their order special, maybe with a handwritten thank you card, confetti, a fun sticker…you get the idea.

Take the extra steps to surprise and delight customers 

Making the customer experience feel special doesn’t have to be expensive or time-consuming. Behind-the-scenes or production photos are a great way to keep your customers excited about their order. And it builds trust between them and your brand.

What can you do as a service-based business and you’re not sending customers tangible items? Lots of things! Get creative with your communication. Send a welcome video or message to new customers. Thank them for their business and let them know that they made the right choice supporting you. Share links to your social media or other services that they may like.

Whether you’re a product-based business or service-based business, you can and should find ways to go the extra mile for the customer experience. You’ll build up your brand and your brand reputation. Take a page out of Disney’s book and try to jazz up the customer experience wherever you can, because your efforts will pay off. 

Not sure where your customer touchpoints are? Our Customer Ascension Model can help — and you can get it totally for free inside our magical Biz Bundle!