Reinier and I were at the Apple Store Regent Street this afternoon, admiring the new iPod line (short review to come soon). Besides finding some new details about the iPods that aren’t visible in the adds, we also noticed something about Apple’s personal approach to offering support: the Genius Bar.

The Genius Bar is a bar-like counter in the middle of every Apple Store, where a Mac user can get help from a so called genius. The Genius Bar can help you with hardware problems (which I have had a lot) but also with software problems. Across the bar is another bar called the iPod Bar where iPod users can get help with their iPod. These bars are in the middle of the store, among people buying their new stuff that they hope to never have to bring to the bar.

In a traditional electronics store like Media World or PC World, these service desks tend to be hidden in some kind of hidden part of the store, tucked away to hide angry customers from the new customers that are about to buy their new products. In some cases (like in the Media World in Arnhem, NL) this service desk even has its own entrance to avoid any new customer from ever seeingwhat goes on in the service area.

Clearly, stores like PC World have a good reason to make sure that you, the new customer, don’t notice that there are 10 people in the service area with the crappy product that you just wanted to buy. Imagine buying an HP laptop while you see 4 people in line at the support counter with the same laptop! Amazingly stores like PC World will even charge you £29 for installing your Windows again, while a MacBook can be reset in the Apple Store for free (within warranty).

Customer Support - Also Relevant to Experience Design

Apple’s decision to make their support desk so extremely present in the Apple Store doesn’t just show that they have major guts, it also shows that Apple considers support to be part of the product you buy and therefore part of their experience. When you buy an Apple you get support, it is there in the store, it is something that you can rely on. When you buy a PC or any other hardware, you just get the option of support. When you want support, you will first have to ask for it, as it won’t always just be there for you.

Obviously this comes with consequences as Apple will really want to avoid any really pissed of customers. I think that this is why Apple recently fixed my Macbook 1 month after warranty, simply because it was reasonable. Now, this it is probably also the reason that they gave those early iPhone adopters a $100 Apple Store credit. The end result is that Apple soon will have a lot of happy users in the store, that just had some excellent service as they got another $100 to buy a new experience. What is a better image to create to your other new customers?

In the end it is not that hard to do what Apple does, and I would hope that others would follow. To summarize what Apple does I hope to inspire some local companies to give the same experience here is a list of simple things you can do:

1. Make the service desk a nice place to be.
2. Make it present in the store.
3. Get some nice and honest “Geniuses”.
4. Be reasonable.
5. Give your “Geniuses” the power to decide what is reasonable.
6. Take responsibility for what you sell. (See this article for more elaboration)
7. Make customers that need support leave the store with a smile.