Service model for an entrepreneur showroom
Role: Service designer
Company: Espoo
Year: 2017
To design services, one needs to see the whole system and the parts that conform it and figure out the best ways to connect them in order to offer the best experience. A public library in Espoo had a dream of offering a space to local entrepreneurs to showcase their work and we took on the challenge to help them design that service.
This service model is a guide and a blueprint to run a collaborative space within one of Espoo's public libraries. The service contemplate different touch-points so as areas of opportunity and is complemented with a booking website to make it simpler for customers to book. This service was developed with the potential customers who are mostly entrepreneurs.
A collaborative model started all
Iso Omena's public library in Espoo started a program of co-sharing in one of their spaces. This rocketed the concept of a space that could be shared by entrepreneurs to test their business ideas. However for a library with much more responsibilities than managing this space, a proper service design was needed. This is the story of how we helped crafting a service that works for both the customers and the library.
How should the process of booking the space be in order to satisfy the customer's needs in each touch-point from awareness to the end? How would this service be run by the library?
Co-design is much more
than asking an opinion
The key element in our design work was collaboration. Along the process and since day one, we involved stakeholders, focus groups and potential customers in a series of workshops that helped us understand most of the service components. Workshopping with the stakeholders gave us a good picture of how the library works and how other services are managed while workshops with potential customers and focus groups gave us a clear picture of the different touch-points, pain-points and opportunities. For example, we learned that the current service was confusing and not only for the customers, but the library was not sure about it either since no one was appointed as responsible. We also learned that the customers wanted to use it to get as much feedback as possible for what they required a lot of attention on the awareness part of the service towards potential collaborators.
Crafting a service
The design part contemplated all the findings from the research and all the different data obtained in the workshops. This allowed us to craft a concept and even validate it before drawing a blueprint. The blueprint focuses on each step of the journey and the actions that must happen both front-stage and back-stage so as who needs to be involved. Along with the service blueprint, is a concept of a booking website and booking format that customers can fill-up to book the space. On the library's side, this is easy to manage as there is a dedicated space and platform that they can add to their service ecosystem.
Showroom, as we call it, is not only a room. It is a space for collaboration, co-creation and sharing that empowers local entrepreneurs and inspires library customers at the same time. It is an example in how local businesses are backed by society.
A service to fall in love with
Our main goal was to offer a service that helps people and serves the library, but we ended up creating a service that goes beyond. It is about support of the local community towards local entrepreneurs and how the libraries in Espoo also support this. We wanted the service to resemble that and thus an experience that can be enjoyed and, why not, loved by everyone from customers to stakeholders. The concept focuses on serving the customers by allowing them to personalise how they want to use it and serving the library with a simple and efficient process.
We heard and we show it
The insights we got along the way and the stages we identified are reflected in each of the steps of the project. We made sure we captured and showed as much as possible and that those insights helped us to shape this service. After all, the service's focus is collaboration, so we wanted to share that value.
The service in
11 steps
We decided to show our blue print in the shape of a story. Through the journey of a 2 year experienced entrepreneur, we showed all the steps from awareness to recommendation that the service should follow. Our service combines both digital and analog interactions and contemplates recommendation as the last step. This means that we hope the word to spread and to more entrepreneurs to use this space. Along with the steps, we included the tasks that the library should take care of in order to succeed. As said, the final proposition included a website and a booking form.
