Our video of the week shows Michael in an interview with Theresa Schmid, a Master student at the Stuttgart Media University. The two met in the underground garage of a multi-storey car park in downtown Augsburg, directly in front of the charging stations of the local electricity provider. Here Michael asked Theresa a few questions about her study project, which she is researching at a large OEM.

Six phases of customer experience

“I deal with the customer experience when charging an electric vehicle.” In concrete terms, the aim is to work out what happens when the customer buys an electric car. Which phases are important for the OEM to consider, from the purchase desire itself to the sale of the vehicle a few years later.

A distinction is made between the following six phases of customer experience:

information stage
transaction
Handover of the vehicle
Shop at home
Shop on the road
Sale of the vehicle
It is important to consider the entire process, the so-called Customer Journey. Of course, this is not straightforward and shows breaks in this customer experience. These are effective optimization potentials.

A good example of this is its use when charging at the charging station. The customer stands at the charging station and has time, a certain break in the personal experience with his electric car. It is interesting for the OEMs to find out what the customer is doing during this time. How can the manufacturer support the bridging of this time in a meaningful way?

Another break is the waiting time until the new vehicle arrives. This phase also needs to be bridged, but the passive phase has great potential, since the customer is usually full of joyful expectations for his new vehicle.