Time's Up!

13Customer Transformations

With transformations, the customer IS the product!

—B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore, The Experience Economy: Competing for Customer Time, Attention, and Money, 2019

Imagine you are in the market for a landscaper for your relatively small front and back yards. Being prudent, you research online, find some highly recommended companies, and contact three of them for bids.

The first arrives and walks around your front and back yard with a clipboard. We all know what he is doing—scoping the work. How big is the lawn, how many trees, bushes, etc. He concludes by telling you he will handle the yard's maintenance at $80 per hour. Of course, that raises more questions than it answers: How long will it take? Will it vary every week, depending on who you have do the work? and so on. He is pricing based on inputs.

The second landscaper arrives and performs the same ritual. He informs you that he will do the work for a fixed price of $120 per month. This is better than the first company because it provides certainty in price and does not raise any of those useless questions such as how long it will take. He is pricing based on outputs—a specific scope of work. If something happens outside of that scope—a tree dies, a sprinkler head needs replacing, etc.—you will most likely go through a change request process and be charged an additional amount, agreed to in advance of the work.

Then the third landscaper arrives. He begins by asking you questions: