By Patricia Roller
The recent flight of two billionaires to space sparked a lot of controversy.
Jeff Bezos, donning a cowboy hat and Omega watch, kissing his diamond-clad girlfriend, received a lot of envious and vile comments. We won't take sides here, or debate a complex subject, but want to share a secret with you on how he funded his space travel. In fact, it isn't a secret—he revealed the fact himself by thanking his employees and customers.
In thousands of research interviews, whether e-commerce, financial services, healthcare, or B2B transactions, all participants point back to Amazon. The question is generally, “What customer experience do you see as the Northstar?” Amazon, every time.
Realistically, Amazon can’t always be the best, as its prided “voice interactions” still have to move from gimmicky to meaningful, but Amazon is predictable and best-in-class at scale. If you really want to ding Jeff Bezos, provide or demand a better experience from other vendors, suppliers, providers.
I was reminded of that today when I tried to order coffee from Nespresso. I have an account in the US and in Germany with two separate log-ins, where I also need two different browsers. I found myself so frustrated that I ordered my coffee from Amazon in under a minute. If that gets Jeff Bezos to space, so be it. Our research participants would probably make the same decision.