Don’t Bore Me to Death With Your Digital Experience

If brand is experience, and experience is brand, why do most digital journeys feel like filing a tax return?

This year’s MAD//Fest theme is “Be Less Boring” and it got me thinking. What’s the most boring part of marketing that still gets a free pass? For me, it’s digital experience.

In an age where everyone is finally getting the basics right, “fine” is code for boring. And worse still, forgettable.

Let’s be honest. Most digital experiences are… fine. Functional. Polite. Maybe even frictionless, if you’re lucky. And here’s the twist: frictionless might be overrated. Booking.com and a major UK grocer both increased conversion by adding friction at checkout, for entirely different reasons. But that’s a story for another post. 

Today, I want to take a stand against the efficient, predictable, personality-free experiences we keep calling “good enough.” They don’t have to be that way.

Welcome to the Plateau of Parity

AI, design systems, and performance templates have ushered in a golden age of good enough. Everyone’s checkout works. Everyone’s search works. Everyone’s app loads in under a second.

So where does differentiation come from when everyone is performing to the same standard?

It comes from the unexpected. From the odd. From the oddly delightful. And from a distinctive and confident sense of identity, not from another set of looks and behaviours that conform to the latest social media cultural cues. 

It comes from brand-fuelled quirks embedded deep into product and experience. Not from tone of voice guidelines or styling tweaks layered on top.

And please don’t tell me your next move is a perfectly competent eCommerce site with a soothing colour palette. Surely we can be more imaginative than that. Without having to build a Jony Ive and OpenAI screenless pocket oracle or start messing with Helios-powered eyewear that reads our mid-air gestures. You can start from simple yet wow, imaginative and different. It might even be a delivery method, return policy or clever and unexpected partner offer to surprise and delight. 

Most brands do not need moonshots. They just need to stop sounding and acting like everyone else. 

Brand is Experience. Experience is Brand.

We have all said this for years. And if you are reading me and know me well, you know I have been barking up that tree for a long time. But do we really mean it?

Because if we did, we would not keep shipping digital experiences that look like they were assembled by the same six people in Figma using the same five plugins. We get shinier tools with AI, but I am not sure the results match.

Truly iconic brands do not just look or sound different. They behave differently. Their micro-interactions reflect big beliefs. They express who they are in the smallest of gestures. Or through the smartest backend delivery systems.

Take Monzo. They did not just build a banking app. They embedded transparency into every tap, from instant notifications to freezing your card in seconds.

Notion’s slash command is not just efficient. It represents a philosophy of openness, modularity, and empowerment.

Nike’s SNKRS app turns scarcity and community into a game. It does loyalty better than most loyalty programmes ever will.

Duolingo did not just gamify learning. It turned guilt and humour into habit. The owl, the tone, the storytelling. It is emotional design in action.

Maven Clinic is not just telehealth. It makes women’s and family care feel personal, not clinical. It blends empathy, design, and real support at every touchpoint.

These are not gimmicks. They are expressions of brand DNA, brought to life through product and behaviour. They are hard to copy because they are hard won. They require creative conviction, alignment, and bravery across departments.

Which is exactly why so few brands achieve this.

Surprise is a Strategy

In a world where seamless is standard, surprise is what makes you memorable.

One of the most underused tools in digital design is the pause.

The moment that makes someone stop scrolling.
The line that makes someone smirk.
The animation that earns goodwill.
The delivery update that eased your anxiety and gave you a smile.

According to Forrester’s 2024 report, Experience Differentiation in the Age of AI, 76 percent of brands are investing in personalisation, but only 13 percent are actively surprising their customers.

That tells you everything. We are designing to meet expectations, not to exceed them.

The Real Moat is Emotional Memory

In a market where algorithms optimise everything to death, the best moat is emotional memory.

Your product and experience should feel unmistakably yours. Not just in how they function, but in how they make people feel. Even the error messages should sound like you.

That takes creative risk. Craft. Commercial bravery. Organisational trust. 

So next time you review a UX flow or product roadmap, ask yourself:

Would anyone else do it this way?
Would this make someone smile, pause, or tell a friend?

Because if the answer is no, you might just be boring them to death.

A Personal Confession

Now that I am older, not sure wiser, I have finally learned to embrace my quirks. And oddly enough, it works.

For years I was that person. Among digital teams, I was the one going on about brand nuance and emotional resonance. Among brand purists, I was the one asking for experience logic and platform reality.

Just when people started to warm up to me, I made things worse. I expanded my idea of the product. Not just the thing you sell, but the service, the workflow, the customer ops, the internal tools, the team structure, the culture. Even the change programme and the IT infrastructure. Yes, I went there.

Suddenly I was not just asking about the interface. I was poking around in team dynamics, incentives, legacy systems, and governance models. You can imagine how much people loved that.

But here is what I have learned. The interesting stuff happens between disciplines. That space where code meets craft. Where structure meets soul. That is where real transformation awesome begins.

So here is my advice. Surround yourself with people who do not quite fit. Some call them polymaths. Some call them awkward. I call them essential.

There is power in the overlaps. In the unexpected combinations. In the uninvited questions.

In a world where everything is starting to look and behave the same, oddity is not a liability. It’s your brand’s best chance of standing out.

And if you get stuck or you don’t know how, ask for help. You will be surprised how many brilliant people are just waiting for someone to say, “Want to build something weird and wonderful together?”