Surprise and Delight
Cognitive Triggers & Thinking Beyond
Surprise & Delight
It’s certainly a term most often heard in regards to customer service and not design. However, I am in the mindset that everything we design creates an experience for our customers, and someone will take part in the experience whether it be a simple handmade birthday card, a new user interface for an app, or sketching out the city’s next architectural feat. Surprise and delight is also theme that involves creating astonishment—whether subtle or explosive—at any time during a seemingly normal experience. Even in conversation, some of the best people you’ve ever met probably had a way of surprising you in a delightful way. I believe that despite corporate agendas, the theme of surprise and delight should always be at the forefront of our thinking in our vocation of design.
One example of a great delivery of surprise and delight is taking a visit to Disney World. Somehow, this humid concrete jungle of the South turns into a place where we can expect magic, seeing castles, movie royalty, and walking talking animals, along with other moments only dreamt about. Disney’s secret is that the magic really begins before entering the gate when you see the castle from afar. The expectation set is that an amazing experience is just beyond the gate; then upon arrival, the surprises begin. It’s also found in the simple acts of the park staff greeting you in a cheerful manner and addressing the children as princes and princesses. At any other theme park you are sure to see frustrated parents, couples annoyed at each other, and the mess of just being hot, hungry, and exhausted due to walking around all day in the heat. It’s amazing how we easily forget our own human needs when we are constantly being reminded that the place we stand is magical and almost otherworldly. The delight is at every turn with every new land’s sites, smells, and the ground you walk on changing to reflect a whole new world.
A second example of surprise and delight is found in the practices of the Ritz-Carlton. Their expectation of service may or may not be familiar to you, but it is founded upon their gold standards. An excerpt says:
“The Ritz-Carlton Hotel is a place where the genuine care and comfort of our guests is our highest mission. We pledge to provide the finest personal service and facilities for our guests who will always enjoy a warm, relaxed, yet refined ambience. The Ritz-Carlton experience enlivens the senses, instills well-being, and fulfills even the unexpressed wishes and needs of our guests.”
What we can see is they strive to fulfill even the unexpressed wishes and needs of their guests. In doing so, they’re demonstrating the platinum rule and treating guests as they want to be treated. Their white glove treatment anticipates the needs of every guest. The Ritz-Carlton doesn’t want someone to stay with them just once, they want a lifetime relationship. Should we not also consider the same when it comes to design? We want to build an experience that delights someone in such a personalized way that brings them back for their entire life. When a user is visiting your site are you considering a lifetime investment with them or just looking for page-views and conversion rates?
One resource that I’ve benefited from is over at Zurb. They discuss cognitive triggers and their effectiveness at surpassing the monotony of the web through interactivity and guiding the user to action. Sitemaps are fine when planning the flow of a site; however, Zurb says a deeper understanding of cognitive motivators—I’ll also add the Ritz-Carlton predictability of what the customer wants—is necessary for a successful design. Zurb’s curation of triggers is useful when researching and broadening my skills to be a better design concierge and serve my guests a tasteful entree of design.
So, let’s not simply promise to enchant users with effortless animations. My challenge is for us all, as designers, and as creators of web and mobile experiences to remember the theme of surprise and delight by providing more engaging and dynamic experiences to enrich the lives of the people who participate—not just for one moment—but for the entirety of their lives. Go out and make something memorable.
