Thread by @RohanIrvine

Last speaker!
Joe MacLeod — Ends. A critical difference.

#uxaustralia #UXA2019

As part of @upfrontglobal #Upfront we have more people being part of the presentation getting experience on the stage.

Joe wanted to learn more about ends and why we don't design more of them

We are going to die.

We used to be comfortable with it.

We've distanced ourself from it over centuries both in life and in the products we create.

We've distanced ourselves from the responsibilty of that. The consequences are climate change, financial services abuses etc

During his journey as a consultant everyone gets really excited about onboarding.

Once it's onboarded we distance ourself from it.

We leave it with the consumer to deal with it.

Historically in Europe people were surrounded by death and were comfortable with it.

Until the plague — 1/3 of Europe died.

Death becomes meaningless when everyone was dying around you.

The Catholic church were mis-handling the plague.

They had some product for the rich to get out of purgatory but there was some startup religions that came along.

The protestants took out fasting, decided that if you were doing a good job you were good, and investment in the eyes of God was good so invest in your business.

A couple hundred years later we had an industrial revolution we started having consumers.

The industrial revolution changed the circle of life into a linear path and began telling stories to convince people this was great.

It started distancing us more from the end.

We split us into consumers and experts and there is a distance between us.

Why do emotional endings?

Throughout history we've been good at reflecting and giving thanks.

But what about the things we don't give thanks for?

After paying off a mortgage you get a nice cold letter from the bank saying 'you paid your debt'

Some companies are doing better though.

Marie Kondo has a methodology of giving thanks.

Some companies get into grappling with endings by making lifetime garuntees.

Dominoes Russia said if you get a tattoo of their logo we'll give you pizza for life.

Then something happened, probably global dominoes going "What the fuck are you doing"

It was pulled in 5 days.

The lifetime free flights from American Airlines.

They sold 63 of the tickets.

(There's a great YouTube video going into the details about what a disaster this was)

This company will sell you storage for a heap of money.

Lifetime +100 years.

Cured of a time limiting life.

We need to create complete lifecycles.

What we'll cover now.

Intent.

A lot of culture in business is more growth more growth not elegant lifecycles and longer timeframes.

How to make ends in business culture.

Start with discussing what the end looks like so you can create a reason to stay

Allow people to actively contribute to your product to extend its life cycle

You need to start actively concluding your relationships, experiences, products.

Poor endings smash into your consumer experience

There are two reason consumers leave.

1. The product doesn't suit their needs
2. External factors

Forcing them to stay is not the answer.

Either fix the product or have empathy

If you don't have a multiple engagement model you will have a massive hit to your brand equity

People find it hard to think beyond 5 years. So when KIA came out with a 7 year warranty the market list it's mind.

Since they introduced the 7 year warranty their market share has doubled, and their consumers are loyal.

The gym market is, you can't leave unless you pay us a bunch of money.

TV endings is you have to endure a 1 hour sales interview.

Both these markets have been disrupted no contract gyms with comfortable quick endings. Same with Netflix.

Netflix satisfaction rate is 78% while subscription TV is 63%

Life with Apple phones is easy.

Endings with Apple phones is not.

They think they do.

When they went to return the old broken products they had to fill out a form to return it. "what is this the 1800's"

Apple know an incredible amount of information about your device and where it exists in its life cycle.

But they don't connect these in a meaningful way.

Consumers need encouragement ,support and guidance as their product lifecycle deteriorates.

There are 7 types of endings.
Time out
Exhaustion/credit out
Task/event completion
Broken/withdrawal
Lingering
Proximity
Style/trends

Example: Freemium models

The same companies that do really great freemium endings are bad at the real service endings.

How do we get this into projects?

5x5

5% of our project time. 5 years out.

Types of consumer endings

We need to make sure our ended have been designed with intent.

We need to attach material waste inside the consumer experience.

Making the end consciously connected makes you accountable.

Regulation forced the onboarding experience out of the product and put the ending at the front.

You can't do don't.

It's not actionable.

So what do you do?

If it's actionable we can take it from circle of concern to circle of influence.

Emma who had a lot of health treatments and over in the US saw this idea where at the end of treatment the kids ring this bell.

Health is often a never ending cycle of treatment so having something to signify the end of a phase is incredibly important and empowering.

@threadreaderapp unroll please!