Surprise And Delight — Or, Getting the Closest Shave Possible

I think the best way to introduce yourself is by telling a story. I'm , I'm a writer, and I run Pollinate, a marketing firm that specializes in personality branding, with my partner, Don (he'll be writing posts in this space too!). This is a story about great marketing:

When I was in high school, about a week before my 18th birthday, I received a package in the mail.

This was strange for me at the time; I didn't have a credit card and ebay didn't yet exist, so I didn't get many packages. I asked my parents if it was an early birthday gift, but they hadn't ordered anything.

So I sat down at the table and cracked through the monstrous UPS label holding the box together.

It wasn't what I thought it was going to be, which is to say, I didn't know what I thought it would be, but if I had taken a thousand guesses, this wouldn't have been one of them:

A Gillette Mach 3 razor.

It featured three blades for a close, comfortable shave, specially positioned blades that allowed the same smooth result in fewer strokes, and a patented DLC Comfort Edge to help minimize irritation. On top of that, the lubricating strip gradually faded from a bright blue, telling me exactly when I needed to change blades!

It was my first real razor.

Now, are those features *that* cool? Ehhhh, not really. As an 18 year old guy, could I have thought of better gift ideas? Yeah, about a hundred of them without even trying.

But when I shaved for graduation, do you think I used my old electric whatchyamacallit?

Nope. I used my new Mach3.

And when all the blue strips had faded and I needed replacement blades, do you think I even looked at what other brands offered?

Nope.

And here we are, almost a decade later, and you know what I did this morning?

I went to CVS and bought more Gillette blades.

I worked for Apple Retail for about a year when I got out of school, and one of the questions my manager asked at every morning meeting before the store opened was "how are we going to surprise and delight our customers today?" That's such an important question. It goes beyond "how do we sell more ipods" or "how can we get people to walk out of here with a new computer." It goes beyond sales and gets to the heart of the matter: happy customers are repeat customers. Happy customers (like angry customers) share their experience with friends and family (and everyone on their social networks!) They need to be satisfied with more than the product. They know they're getting an ipod or a Macbook or an iWhatever.  You're not going to surprise them in that regard, and they're already going to be delighted.

So as an employee, what could I do to enhance the experience? Well,  I could greet them with a smile when they walked in the door. I could show them to the product they were looking for and explain the different options to choose from. I could answer their questions and get them checked out quickly. And when they left the store, I could invite them back again with a smile. In short, I could offer them an experience that matched the expectations they had of their iPod. And leaving, they wouldn't just be fans of that iPod, but of Apple. Again, happy customers are repeat customers.

Back to the original story: how does Gillette surprise and delight? For starters, they know exactly who their customer is: an eighteen year old kid who needs a razor but doesn't have any desire in the world to go pick one out. So they do it for them. They sent me one for free, and I've been buying replacement blades ever since. (The blades, by the way, are the expensive part...).

Now I use the Fusion ProGlide. When did I make the switch? At my college graduation, where they were handed out — for free! — when I went to pick up my cap and gown (because every 22 year old kid's mom wants him clean shaven for his graduation picture!). This thing's got Gillette's most advanced blade ever, and it's got five of 'em. It's available in manual or power (I'll admit, I'm a little weirded out by the power one) and it glides over your face effortlessly.

Do I need all of those features? Do I need five friggin' blades? Probably not, but I can't possibly see myself getting anything else.