Shifting the Customer Experience Paradigm
4 frameworks for a unified approach
To define a field, you need tools.
If you read me regularly, you’ll know I think the external force of consumer behaviours is the most transformative disruption driving any change in your organisation.
Shifting the Customer Experience Paradigm: A Unified Approach
Designing for the “customer” isn’t about creating a one-size-fits-all experience.
Trying to pigeonhole your audience into neat categories isn’t just outdated—it’s actively detrimental.
Why?
Customers aren’t static anymore; they constantly evolve, shifting their needs, desires, and identities. Welcome to consumorphosis. New Moment. New Me. New Brand
We live in an age when consumers are changing in real time. Our world is fragmented, riddled with crises (yes, polycrisis), and marked by an ongoing state of self-reinvention. If we don’t recognise that today’s consumer is far from a single entity—they are fluid, changing identities, adapting to their environments, and constantly navigating multiple roles at once—we can’t win at engagement.
Traditional ways of segmenting audiences no longer apply.
It’s not enough to understand people as “young professionals” or “retirees.”
It’s about understanding the real-time fluidity of individual lives—shifting personas, moments of need, and contextual realities. By integrating models that I’ve championed—like Monello’s engagement spectrum, Akerlof’s identity economics, and Duerden’s hierarchy of experiences—we can create experience strategies that go beyond touchpoints, segments, and personas to meet people where they are, when they are, and when they need us most.
Frameworks
Monello’s Skimmers, Swimmers, Divers: A Reflection of Fluid Identities
Mike Monello’s framework—Skimmers, Swimmers, and Divers—offers a tangible approach to customer engagement. This model speaks to something deeper about how people engage with our brands based on the fluidity of their identities in different experience contexts.
It isn’t just about how much someone engages with your brand—it’s about their personal “situationships” at any moment.
Customers are not fixed in one engagement mode.
This model approaches engagement from the perspective that they may be a casual Skimmer, picking up a quick solution to a problem. Still, they could be a Swimmer the next minute, diving deeper into your experience, content, community, or product features. Divers will explore every aspect, spending serious amounts of time in your world, and be passionate about doing it. They may be the smallest percentage of your fandom, but they are its heart and soul. You can spend the least money to reach them, but a lot of time engaging them.
Designing in the flexibility to move between these levels/modes is key—and it’s about creating value not just for a static group but for dynamic individuals. This is exactly what we see with consumorphosis—people shift their identities based on needs, challenges, and desires in the moment. I like the beauty of Monello’s model because, when expanded through the lens of situationships, it offers a strategy that embraces this fluidity, allowing customers to engage at varying depths depending on what they need in the moment.
The idea isn’t to force customers into a specific level of engagement but to create experiences that let them flow freely between these modes. Think how Nike does this. Whether you’re a casual buyer picking up sneakers (Skimmer), someone participating in a fitness challenge (Swimmer), or a loyal brand ambassador running marathons and designing new products (Diver), Nike doesn’t box you into one category. It allows you to move in and out based on your shifting needs, desires, and identities.
Akerlof’s Identity Economics: Reinforcing Fluid, Situational Identities
George Akerlof’s identity economics tells us that people make decisions based on the identities they associate with.
These identities are far from fixed (my label consumorphosis, again!). What we value, buy, and how we act is influenced by who we’re trying to be in a given context.
Akerlof’s book suggested an important and compelling new (at the time) way to look at behaviour, explaining how our identities―and not just economic incentives―influence our decisions.
Interesting side story here:
In 1995, economist Rachel Kranton wrote future Nobel Prize-winner George Akerlof a letter insisting that his most recent paper was wrong. Identity, she argued, was the missing element that would help to explain why people―facing the same economic circumstances―would make different choices. This was the beginning of a fourteen-year collaboration―and of Identity Economics.
The book explains how our conception of who we are and who we want to be shapes our economic lives more than any other factor, affecting how hard we work and learn, spend, and save. Identity economics was/is a new way to understand people's decisions―and how we can better understand why incentives like stock options work or don't; why some schools succeed and others don't; why some cities and towns don't invest in their futures―and much, much more.
Thus, people's identity―their conception of who they are and who they choose to be―may be the most important factor affecting their economic lives, and why they choose one experience or brand over another.
And here’s where situationships kick in.
A person’s identity also shifts depending on external contexts. Their environment—the world around them—constantly influences who they need to be. In the polycrisis world, where the demands on people are in constant flux (from economic instability to environmental concerns), people are not holding onto rigid identities. They’re fluid, constantly adapting to the shifting sands of their world.
Take Patagonia as an example. They don’t sell jackets—they sell a commitment to environmental sustainability, an identity their customers align with. But what happens when those identities shift? If a customer’s financial situation worsens, their identity will change from an "environmentally conscious consumer" to a "practical shopper." So Patagonia design their experiences (plural) to reflect that changed need, reinforcing their identity within different situational contexts. It’s not just about sticking to one identity—it’s about aligning with how that identity may shift depending on the crisis or challenge.
See how consumorphosis is at play again?
As consumers’ identities evolve in response to their environment, brands must design experiences recognising these shifts. It’s about understanding the deeper emotional currents driving decisions and being able to meet customers in their identity at that moment.
Having sharp, future-focused insight about your customers’ evolving identities means you can adapt and serve experiences as they are, not as they were.
Duerden’s Hierarchy of Experiences: Elevating the Fluid Journey
To define a field, you need tools.
And what better framework to give a refresh than Maslow’s hierarchy of needs? Now, there’s nothing wrong with Maslow. He is a universally recognised, handy reference point that can be (and often is) whipped out in many a meeting to get everyone thinking in the same lane.
However, it’s also unsatisfyingly general and overused to the point of – dare I say it – boring.
To truly sell the value of experiences, we need something more specific.
Mat Duerden’s Hierarchy of Experiences—ordinary —> meaningful —> transformative—helps us understand the different levels of emotional engagement customers might experience. But how can we interact with the shifting identities that our customers are constantly navigating?
The answer is to recognise that not all moments need to be transformative, but they do need to be meaningful in the context of a person’s current identity.
In a world defined by consumorphosis, experiences can’t just be smooth or frictionless (or ordinary or bland). They need to resonate with people’s shifting sense of self—to offer something emotionally relevant and valuable for where they are in their journey.
Take Airbnb. A simple booking seems like an ordinary experience—until you see the situational context of the customer. A young couple booking a spontaneous weekend getaway may have very different emotional needs than a family looking for a safe place during a crisis. Airbnb’s ability to move between ordinary and meaningful—and even transform the experience—is a good example of how understanding shifting identities and contexts can offer more impactful experiences.
If a brand can make its experience emotionally valuable and aligns with the customer’s evolving needs and identities, that experience becomes worth the customer’s time.
And Time is today’s most valuable currency. It’s scarce, so we carefully choose what we invest it in.
This makes the journey deeper and more connected, even if it’s fleeting.
Pine’s Delta Model: Evolving from Work to Wonder in Fluid Contexts
Joe Pine’s Delta Model (Work —> Wisdom —> Wonder) is a great framework for creating value, but looked at through the lens of consumorphosis and situational identities, it becomes clear that it’s not just about offering functional value. It’s about layering on wisdom and wonder that respond to how people’s identities are in flux.
Work solves problems, but Wisdom and Wonder speak to deeper emotional needs—needs that are also fluid, shifting with time and context. For instance, when a customer interacts with a brand during a stressful life moment (e.g., financial strain or a personal crisis), that experience shouldn’t just be transactional. Brands must provide wisdom, offering clarity, insight, or education that helps customers navigate their world. And yes, they should also offer moments of wonder—emotional touchpoints that bring delight, even in difficult times.
Consumers don’t always need the same thing. Their needs depend on their situation. A single product or service could serve different emotional needs based on the customer’s identity and context. To meet those needs, understand these fluid shifts and design experiences that offer work, wisdom, and wonder in a way that fits the situation.
Conclusion: Designing for a Fluid Future
By weaving together Monello’s engagement spectrum, Akerlof’s identity economics, Duerden’s hierarchy of experiences, Pine’s Delta Model, and consumorphosis, we achieve an integrated, practical, and more understandable approach to experiences and their design.
If I can leave you with just one takeaway, it's that static categories no longer define customers. They are fluid, moving through multiple identities, changing with the crises and complexities of the world around them. We must learn to meet them in their situationships, creating experiences that flex and adapt to the moment.
With consumorphosis driving this change, we can’t afford to think of experiences as one-size-fits-all. Instead, we should focus on creating relevance in real time. Understand the customer’s situation, respect their time, and design for a future where customers don’t just engage with our experiences, our brand—they evolve with us.
By building these principles into our experience strategies, we’re not just reacting to the changes in customer behaviour; we’re shaping how those changes unfold.
And I think that’s the future of customer experience.
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