What is it like to be a human being inside your business?
A Client Experience Assessment is an independent, outside-in field study of the passage between what your business intends to offer and what a customer actually encounters.
You commission me to become your customer.
I arrive without being taught how everything is supposed to work, experience the business as naturally as possible, and report back on what became visible from the other side.
I’m paying particular attention to where intention and experience diverge; where the customer has to compensate for something the business hasn’t made clear; what builds or spends trust; what feels unusually considered; and what is already working so beautifully that I wouldn’t touch it.
This is not mystery shopping, staff surveillance, a public review, or an attempt to optimize every charming human irregularity out of your business.
The field notes are public. The findings are yours.
How the Expedition Works
01 — Request an Assessment
You submit a short request telling me what the business is, where it is, and what kind of customer experience you want assessed.
Crucially, don’t tell me what you think is wrong.
02 — I Determine Fit
Upon receipt, I will determine fit. As confirmation for the commissioned assessment, you will receive the commission agreement + payment link.
Assessments begin at $950.
The final commission depends on the scope of the experience, travel required, and ordinary customer cost. Any significant purchase, ticket, meal, stay, or participation expense will be included transparently in the commission before you book.
03 — The Commission Is Confirmed
Any necessary experience expenses are accounted for. I receive only the logistical information required to enter the experience successfully.
Please resist the urge to prepare me.
Don’t explain the customer journey, identify known trouble spots, brief your staff about me, or tell me what you hope I’ll find unless there’s a genuine safety or accessibility reason I need to know.
Not knowing is part of the instrument.
Staff should generally not be told I am conducting an assessment.
This is not because I am attempting to catch anyone behaving badly. Quite the opposite: I want to encounter the system as it normally operates. Individual employees are not the object of the assessment.
04 — I Become the Customer
The assessment begins before I arrive.
Websites, booking systems, directions, confirmations, parking instructions, emails and other materials an ordinary customer would encounter may all become part of the observation.
Please do not create special instructions, accommodations or communications for my visit unless they would ordinarily be provided to another customer.
Following my experience, and as part of my deeper research, a second assessment will be issued.
05 — You Receive the Findings
You receive a written field report documenting the experience, significant observations, points of friction or transferred labor, moments of unusual consideration, contradictions between expectation and experience, and anything I strongly recommend leaving alone.
We then meet for a private findings conversation so I can give context, answer questions, and help distinguish what deserves action from what merely deserves attention.
See your business from the other side.
You know your business from the inside.
That’s precisely why there may be things you can no longer see.
A first encounter is perishable information. Before someone teaches me where to stand, what happens next, or how everything is supposed to work, I can tell you what actually arrived.
Requesting an assessment does not obligate you to book.
If the business or experience isn’t a fit for this method, I’ll tell you.