Expectant Fathers

Lesson 4: Expectations While You're Both Expecting

How Important Are Expectations When You're Expecting?

Let’s say that you’re looking for a great pair of shoes for that special Saturday night. They need to be the perfect complement to your black cocktail dress, be stylish, be a little different from the “usual”, and accent the shape of your legs. You already know a couple of stores that may have just the shoes you want to buy.

Let’s stop here in our fantasy shopping trip and answer a few questions. What will make your shopping for shoes the perfect experience? In other words, what determines which stores you’ll visit? Do they have to offer great customer service? How do you define “great customer service”? Is it friendly, personalized service? Do you require that the store you chose provide lots of beautiful shoes to select from? How about prices? Are you looking for the lowest price and the highest quality from the store? Will a pair of black Keds with a spike heel do? Probably not. Should the store be convenient? Does that mean within 30 minutes from your house? One hour? What makes some stores inviting to shop in while others are passed over without a thought about going in? What explanation will you give your husband for why you needed the shoes?

Your answers to these questions form the criteria used in deciding where you shop and what you purchase. You start with a set of expectations, first about the item (a commanding pair of shoes) and then about the ideal store that will meet your expectations. To truly be a good shopping experience certain conditions must be met. Namely, the shoes and the store have to meet your strict standards in order to be selected; which are the answers to the previous questions. If they do meet your standard, you feel satisfied, happy and newly shod. Think of these “buying” expectations as your personal qualifying standards.

Imagine that several weeks go by. You have another special dinner party to attend and of course you need another pair of stellar shoes (fashion extenders). What influences whether you’ll return to the same stores as you previously visited? You’re likely to shop again at these stores when they consistently deliver everything that meets your critical standards for a shoe store. It is well known that when stores want your business they will try to please you. They’ll learn everything possible about your customer expectations (preferences) and work hard to meet them. They want you to feel satisfied every time you walk through their doors, regardless of the shoes you have on.

However, sometimes expectations aren’t met and you feel disappointed. A rude salesperson making you wait 5 or 10 minutes at a register while they chat with their sister on the phone or a jumbled assortment of last year’s styles looking like a rag pile can leave you feeling like you’ve wasted your time and effort. If your disappointment is great enough, you’re likely to never visit the store again or have anything good to say about them. If you’ve been disappointed, they’ve completely missed the point of your coming in . . . which was to have your expectations met. In this case, they’ve fallen completely outside of your expectation box. You do have the choice of lowering your expectations in this situation and making the best of it. But more likely you’ll make the choice to leave and never return.

Stores know the importance of meeting their customers’ expectations if they’re to gain repeat business. Consequently, they spend a tremendous amount of money and time engineering the shopping experience to make you, the customer, feel special every time you go in. This attention to detail by stores extends from the personnel they hire and train to the live piano music you’ll find at Nordstrom’s. Successful stores design themselves to make you feel unique and to create the most enjoyable experience possible.

There are times when rather than simply meeting your expectations for a great shopping trip, or walking away disappointed, you can be pleasantly surprised. For example, getting a free “gift” with your purchase makes you feel that you’ve received more value than expected.

Estee Lauder began offering free samples of her company’s product line with certain cosmetic purchases in the 1950s. She understood that it wasn’t enough to simply have the specific products her customers were seeking. Estee Lauder recognized that her customers were also looking for bargains. Rather than lowering the price of her items, she seized the opportunity to put additional products with the purchase. But she also knew that if this happened every time, her customers would come to “expect” the extra item. So, she offered different “gifts” with different purchases at different times. In that way the buyer would feel pleasantly surprised when they received that little something extra. Of course it was also a great way to introduce the complete line of Estee Lauder products to customers and have promotional items such as cosmetic bags and umbrellas in the public’s eye. Using these marketing techniques helped make Estee Lauder one of the largest cosmetic companies in the world.

The idea of providing a “free gift with your purchase” is an example of a company striving to exceed your expectations. However, if the free gift is received with every purchase, you would come to expect it. In fact, you’d be disappointed when you didn’t get that package of free samples. So “occasional” meant “surprised.”

The principle being stated is that when good things occasionally happen that exceed your expectations, you feel pleasantly surprised. When negative things occasionally occur, you feel disappointed. If things occur regularly and they are important for you, you come to expect them.

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