The Customer Expectation Triangle of Death

0:00I'm going to go.

0:30Ryan Hanley:It's a common myth that businesses die because of their competition, and we spend so much time focusing there. When in reality, these businesses struggle, stagnate. These businesses are destroyed. They fall apart. Money wasted, investment dollars lit on fire because they don't understand this very simple concept, the customer expectation triangle of death. Today, we're going to break this concept down, explain exactly how you apply it to your business and why understanding this concept will immediately set you apart, focus you on the things you need to build and grow your business. Let's go.

1:16Ryan Hanley:Hello, my name is Ryan Hanley. I am the founder of Finding Peak, a leadership and growth-focused media company and coaching company, and today I'm breaking down the customer expectation triangle of death. This concept, the customer expectation triangle of death, is something that I teach all of my clients, and I've worked with hundreds of leaders across insurance, technology, fitness, and I even have been an executive for more than two decades, founded my own company in 2020 grew it so fast that we were able to exit for multiple seven figures and ultimately left that business in 2024 and now help leaders and individuals like yourselves get the most out of the companies that we are trying to grow.

2:00Ryan Hanley:I'm so glad you're here. Let's dive into this concept. This is something that every one of my clients goes through, that we work through this concept because what it does is when we understand how our marketplace is evolving and what our customers are expecting of our business, it allows us to laser focus on the activities, the products, the marketing campaign, the messaging, the people we need to hire. It allows us to laser focus on what we need to do every day to grow our business. Now, before we can completely understand this concept of the customer expectation triangle of death, the first thing we need to do is understand that we have gone through multiple ages of business.

2:41Ryan Hanley:If you are in your 30s or 40s, you've already seen this. If you're older than that, then you've definitely experienced this. Our younger viewers, I'm going to explain a couple concepts to you because you haven't actually lived through some of these ages. Now, the first age is what we call the analog age. The analog age was basically all of business up to about the year 2000, right? This is when the dot-com bubble hit. This is when every business in the world was trying to move to the internet as fast as they possibly could. And right. So this is basically up to the year 2000, right? The next age that we experienced was the digital age.

3:23Ryan Hanley:And the digital age runs from 2000 to basically 2020. Okay. So this 20 year period here, this is the digital age. And the digital age is what most of us are used to. And essentially, we're watching this on YouTube, or if you're listening to it in the audio format, if you want to see what I'm drawing here, make sure you jump over to YouTube and watch. But all the technology that we use today, everything we talk about, most of that was invented in a digital age. Now, most of the concepts, the philosophical concepts of business that we have applied digital tools to were developed during the analog age.

4:03However, and this worked pretty well, right?

4:06Ryan Hanley:This is things like APIs and using digital CRMs and the ability to do marketing automation and all this different stuff, right? The technology, the technology as an industry in the way that we view it today, all of this was born during the digital age. But we now live in the age of AI. And the age of AI is basically going to be from 2020 and beyond. Now, this video isn't necessarily about AI, but we have to be cognizant of the fact that AI as an age and what this technology and how this technology is impacting our businesses is incredibly important. Now, we're going to jump back and forth between here.

4:50Ryan Hanley:Let's draw our triangle. So if we take and we bake out our triangle like this, right? This is our customer expectation triangle of death. And the reason I throw the of death on there is because while, you know, customer expectation triangle sounds great, you throw an of death on the end and it sounds a little more spooky, puts a little more urgency in it. And ultimately, the truth is, if we don't understand the concepts around what our customer... I'm going to go to Tokyo. customers actually expect, at least at a high level, then our business is going to die. We're going to be unfocused in the products we create.

5:55Ryan Hanley:We're going to be, you know, flailing as we throw out all different types of messaging, as we try to attach our product or sell our product to different ICPs. And what that does is it creates all this activity with very little growth in order to go from launch to escape velocity, right? So a big part of my work is helping founders, early stage startups or leaders who have launched a business but are struggling to get their head above water, to get themselves out of that business, to get their business creating enough revenue to operate without the stress of a constant burn, right? I call that escape velocity.

6:32Ryan Hanley:So we are launching our business and the gravity of that launch, of all the pressure, of all the work that it takes to get your product into the market, to figure out who's going to buy it, to get the messaging, to build the systems, to actually deliver the product, et cetera, that gravity holding us down keeps us from escape velocity where we can really, you know, to keep the space analogy going, which I didn't plan, by the way, you know, get those rockets in gear so we can really blast off into the next solar system or galaxy or whatever, right? Like, in order to get there, we have to reach escape velocity first.

7:06Ryan Hanley:And if we don't understand what our customers expect, then we are not going to be focused enough to get there. So what does the customer expectation triangle of death look like? Well, in the analog era, there was really three points to this triangle. There's three points to every triangle, but there's three points that made sense, right? We had quality of product. We had the price of the product and we had the speed slash ease of delivery. Okay. And during the analog era, and this is why I broke down our three eras right here. The reason that we broke these three eras down is that customer expectations have evolved throughout time.

7:52Ryan Hanley:So up until the year 2000, during the analog era, right, customers only expected us to be able to deliver two sides of this triangle, right? So we could be fast or easy to do business with, and we could have a solid competitive price. But our customers would expect in that scenario that our quality, the quality of our product, right, that it may not be as good. And we were making that judgment. If we wanted a quality product, but we wanted it at a competitive or low price, it was probably going to be very hard to find or very hard to deal with, right? So quality product, competitive price. So these would be two sides of the triangle we expect hard, hard to do here.

8:39Ryan Hanley:And if during the analog era, you were able to provide all three sides of this triangle, right? That's how you want. So if your product could deliver on all three sides of the triangle, you stood out and you won during the analog era, right? So customers only expected to and would do business with most companies based on two and the companies that could deliver all three, those were the companies that stood out and won. If we want to think of some companies that really won during this time, think of Walmart, right? Walmart was easy to do business with. They always had competitively priced. And to varying degrees, based on price and speed of use, they had quality products.

9:27Ryan Hanley:Target, kind of same model. Another example would be FedEx. FedEx came in. They're going to get your product there. They're going to be competitively priced. And their value proposition was always that they were going to be faster than the U.S. mail if you needed to send a package. So during the analog era, if we delivered all three sides of this triangle, we were beating our customers' expectations. We stood out and we won. So customer expectation, two sides, winners, three sides. As we transition to the digital era, customers now expect all three sides of this triangle. So where during the analog era, high quality, competitive price, tough to do business with, easy to get the product, competitive price, probably low quality, and if you could deliver all three sides you stood out, now customers expect all three sides of the triangle as a baseline.

10:19Ryan Hanley:So just in order to do business during the digital era, 2000, 2020, customers now expect you to have a good quality product for it to be competitively priced and for it to be easy and delivered quickly relative to what the product is. So if you can't deliver all three sides of this triangle post 2000, you don't have a business. You're dead on arrival. You need to deliver all three. So how do winners stand out when all three sides of this triangle are expected by customers? And the answer was experience.

10:59Ryan Hanley:What was the actual experience like? How did you make people feel? So winners in this environment were Amazon. So when we think of an experience, one, what Amazon provided was very obviously all three sides of this trial. Incredibly easy to do business with. The price is always competitive and easily compared. And the quality, while varying based on what you're looking for, they always had quality products. So how did Amazon differentiate themselves from, say, a Walmart or a Target? What they were able to do was deliver a customized experience for you. You could get everything you could possibly think of or need in one place.

11:39Ryan Hanley:As you use the platform, the platform became more dialed into what you like to buy, what you like to watch, what you like to read. And more and more that Amazon shaped an experience to you as a consumer. So no longer did you have to go and necessarily search endless directories to find what you wanted. What you wanted was quite often served directly to you. Another great example of this is Apple, right? There's a lot of cell phones out there. High quality product, competitively priced relatively, speed, easy to use. You can walk right in an Apple store, walk out with a phone that day. But there was the Apple experience, the iPhone, right?

12:20Ryan Hanley:The touchscreen, the ecosystem. You know, you were part of this Apple experience that you got. You know, it was very different, very unique. and for the people who wanted that experience, it was like part of their identity. And this experience is what helped you set yourself apart. But we no longer live in the digital era. We are in the age of AI. Now, today, in the age of AI, customers now expect a high quality product for it to be easy to get and to be able to receive it quite quickly. And they need the price to be competitive because price comparison is ubiquitous today. There's comparative raters in almost every industry for every product that you could possibly buy.

13:09Ryan Hanley:So we know we're getting a competitive price. Doesn't always have to be the lowest, but it has to be competitive. Additionally, we expect those products to come with some sort of experience when we're buying them, right? We expect there to be an ecosystem, a platform, whatever particular to that business that we're working with, we expect there to be an experience associated with it. Think Uber, right? Car pulls up, you have the app, you know exactly where you're going, how long it's going to take, how much the ride costs. It's a completely different experience than going out and hiring a taxi, right?

13:46Ryan Hanley:You're going to expect high quality, you're going to expect it to be easy, you're going to expect the price to be competitive, and the experience of using the Uber application and what it takes, you know, easily get to wherever you need to go. The driver knows where they're going, you're in sync, etc. Experience. So now all four of these are expected, the three points of the triangle as well as experience. But we are no longer in the digital age. We're in the age of AI. And in the age of AI, all four of these are expected, as we said. So how do we stand out in the age of AI, and now we need to be the signal.

14:23Ryan Hanley:So the big differentiator in the age of AI is trust. It's connection. It's authenticity. It's our belief in the brand, in the message, in what it says about me as a consumer buying your product. Are you able to separate yourself as a signal, as a thought leader, as someone who provides entertainment, education, insight, connection, access, whatever it is, how do you create signal, right? Signal that explains your experience, that delivers your high quality product that's easy to get at a competitive price. If you are neglecting your signal, then no one knows. I'm going to try to draw a little antenna here.

15:19Ryan Hanley:I'm not very good at drawing. If you're able to be the signal in the noise, now you're able to stand out. People can find you. Part of being the signal is now they trust you because you're either making them laugh or you're educating them or you're providing them insights or access or community, right? You're some sort of signal that separates you and defines you and creates that trust, respect, connection to your brand, what it means for that individual to be part of your brand. You know, what does it say about me that I use Apple products? What does it say about me that I choose liquid death as my carbonated water of choice or that I choose to use a Yeti versus some other type of beverage container.

16:13Ryan Hanley:Tesla, right? What does it say about me that I have a Tesla, that I drive an electric car, right? So Tesla stands out with its signal, right? A lot of that is Elon Musk and his marketing. And whether you like Elon Musk or not, he's incredibly good at being a signal in the noise, right? Which explains the experience that you get by being a Tesla driver because we're expecting it to be a high-quality product that's easy to get at a competitive price. This episode is sponsored by Morgan Stanley's Thoughts on the Market. It can be difficult to stay up to date on the financial market in today's ever-changing environment.

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17:33Ryan Hanley:And how we think about these things, right? How we think about each phase that we're in, right? Allows us to focus. So if we are struggling at a base level to keep people retained, right? So if our retention rate is poor, then we want to stay inside our triangle. Are we delivering a good quality product that we believe in, right? Are we competitively priced? Are we easy to do business with and are we delivering our product on time and in an expected amount of time, right? If you're struggling to retain, then here's where we need to focus. Maybe we just need to work on our actual product and make our product better.

18:13Ryan Hanley:If people who actually buy the product stick around and consider the product quality, right? So we're not having a problem with our product, but we're having a problem with people actually engaging, interacting, etc., then that's probably an experience issue. We haven't created an experience that matches the expectation of the customers that we want to attract to our product. If we are having a hard time getting customers at all, that is because we are not focused on our signal. So we work from the inside out. We want to first figure out, is our product competitively priced, high quality, and easy to do business with?

18:55Ryan Hanley:If the answer there is yes, then what is the experience that we're providing to the types of customers that we want to bring in? And finally, if we are struggling to actually get customers to go through our experience and ultimately purchase our product, then we need to work on them being the signal. But we cannot neglect in the age of AI any of these five points that make up ultimately the customer expectation triangle of debt. Now, a quick story here from my own life. The business that I founded in 2020 was called Rogue Risk. We are a national digital commercial insurance agency, and our entire value proposition was we could deliver the same amount of value and the same amount of experience to our customers virtually that other insurance agencies and brokerages were delivering in person.

19:47Ryan Hanley:We were able to grow it as fast as we were because we were dialed on the customer expectation triangle of death. The entire premise of our agency was that we could deliver a commercial insurance experience to customers virtually with the same amount of value and the same amount of experience that was delivered in person, which was the traditional way in which commercial insurance is purchased, right? We felt it was disrespectful to force our customers to have to take time out of their day to drive to an office and go through all the rigmarole of purchasing commercial insurance, that we could deliver that same amount of value in less time virtually with the same amount of value.

20:27Ryan Hanley:And it was working through that process, working through the customer expectation triangle of debt, that we were able to set up our business to do that. And in my opinion, the fact that we were able to grow the business in two years to the point we were actually acquired for multiple seven figures, and then I was ultimately able to exit two years after that shows that when we dial to this process, you can rapidly grow a business. Now, in our case, what we did was we partnered with some of the highest quality insurance carriers that exist in the United States, right? So we had a high quality product.

21:00Ryan Hanley:We had multiple options for carriers. So we were always going to have a competitive price and we were delivering everything virtually. We were very easy to do business with, very easy to connect with. We had employees scattered across the United States. So we were in all four time zones. We were able to connect with people if they needed to. And then we had all kinds of digital experiences, which allowed customers to engage with us as much as they saw fit. There was essentially a self-service option. There were options where there were just simple touch points. And then there were options where they could go all the way to having a virtual face-to-face meeting with one of our reps, if that's what they wanted.

21:39Ryan Hanley:And that experience, right, streamlined, very transparent. We shared every piece of information that we had with them. Our tagline was, we do insurance differently by giving you the information to make the right insurance decision. We always wanted our customers to come from a place of power. That was our experience. And then we leveraged YouTube by by answering more than 500 commercial insurance questions on YouTube in a very direct, very conversational manner allowed us to become the signal. The signal brought customers in because they trusted us because we were giving all of our information, all of our experience away for free.

22:19Ryan Hanley:That then allowed us to create a digital experience for those people that was kind of a choose your own adventure, right? Did you want to go, you know, how much did you want to do yourself? How much did you want your handhold? And we had options for all of that, for people to be able to come in and get advice if they needed, or they could go through the process themselves. And then we were always, because of the carrier partners that we worked with, delivering a high quality product at a competitive price that was easy to do business with. My friends, this does sound like kind of a ethereal, high level topic, but I'm telling you, working through this thought process in your business will allow you to stay focused, right?

22:54Ryan Hanley:If you find that people are objecting because of price, you know, here's where you have to work. If you find that people are choosing other providers, right? Maybe it's because of the quality of your product has gone down or isn't matching customer expectations, right? Is your experience matched to the type of customers that you want to do business with? If you're looking to work with tech founders and tech companies, and you know, you're, you're forcing them to come to an in-person meeting to sell them. Oftentimes those individuals are not going to want that experience. That's a broad stroke, But in general, those types of businesses are not going to want to have to take time out of their day to drive somewhere to purchase something like, in our case, commercial insurance.

23:34Ryan Hanley:But insert your product where necessary. And ultimately, we have to, in the age of AI, with how easy it is to create content, with how ubiquitous content is, we have to figure out how to be the signal in the noise. My friends, I promise you, if you dial in on the customer expectation triangle of depth and you spend time working through this process, you will figure out where you need to focus your attention and what you focus on is what you become. If you enjoyed this video, please subscribe. Please share this with friends. If you have questions, leave them in the comments below this video. I answer all the questions.

24:09Ryan Hanley:And if you want to go deeper on topics like this, there is a link in the description below. Go to findingpeak.com. That is where I publish all of my work, all of my ideas. All of these videos are also there. You can dive in, connect. I love you for being here. Get out there, kick ass. I'll catch you on the next one. I'm out of here. Peace!

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