Talk to successful high end retailers like Starbucks, Holt Renfrew or Apple Stores, and they'll tell you they're not selling goods and services, they're selling an experience.  Going into many stores today is as much about the process of buying the product as it is about the product itself; and that's especially true at the premium end of the market.

So here's a simple thought experiment.

First, spend five minutes with your team talking about the top three adjectives you'd like to have clients use to describe the experience of doing business with you.  Depending on the clients you serve, those could include words like caring, efficient, non-intimidating, organized, professional, responsive, successful, upscale, warm and welcoming, to name only a few.

Once you've determined those words, agree that over the next couple of days, each member of your team will walk into your office with a fresh set of eyes.  Rather than looking at things the way you usually do, you'll look at them from the point of view of your clients.  In other words, what's the message that clients get from the initial experience when they come in for a meeting?

The initial impression

Depending on your business model, you may have no control over things like your office parking, signage in the lobby, the hallway when clients walk off the elevator and the reception area of your office.

But just because you don't control a shared reception area doesn't mean you can't get together with other advisors in your branch and influence it.

Do clients see clutter and dying plants when they first come into your reception area? 

How are they greeted by the receptionist?

What kinds of newspapers and magazines are in reception area; current issues of Fortune and Forbes, or six month old copies of Macleans and Readers Digest?  Do newspapers left behind in the reception area sit there all day or are they regularly put away?

When clients go to the closet in the winter to hang up their coats, do they find cheap wire hangers or hangers that are attached to the rod, such as you'd see in an inexpensive hotel?  Or, do they see a handwritten sign on the closet similar to the one that I encountered in one office that said: "Attention staff. These hangers are for clients. Please do not steal them!!!"      

Your meeting room and office

After you've made notes of the initial impact in the reception area move on to your offices and to the conference room in which you meet clients.  Step by step, ask yourself the same questions; if you were looking at this through your clients' eyes, what messages would this send?  And are those messages consistent with the ones you want to send?

The final step is to sit down as a group and discuss what you saw.  If the client experience is 100% aligned with what you want to convey, congratulations.

Chances are, however, that there will be gaps.

And it's at this point that you need to agree to an action plan to elevate the client experience you offer. You may have to delegate responsibility to members of your team.  In some cases, you might have to enlist other advisors to talk to your branch manager, and if there are costs entailed, you may have to share in those costs.

Just remember clients today form judgements; not just by the solutions we provide, but also by the experience in obtaining those solutions.  And in a world where retailers like Starbucks have conditioned clients to expert a higher standard of experience, none of us can afford to be left behind.