A designed experience is decided.
You chose it. The software didn't. Neither did whoever set things up three years ago.
ByDesign is a program of The 3Fifty Group.
A STEP-BY-STEP PROGRAM FOUR MONDAYS · TAUGHT LIVE
Your customers are already having an experience. Did you choose it?
Build a customer experience they can count on.
By Design is a step-by-step customer experience program for small business owners who want customers who stay and send their friends. Four steps, taught live: four Mondays, thirty minutes each. You leave with your customer experience designed, written down, and ready to run without you in the middle of it.
Join the waitlist for the next cohort. You'll hear when registration opens and before it closes.
FOR BUSINESS OWNERS
Running your own business? Keep scrolling. This program is for you.
FOR ORGANIZATIONS
Leading a nonprofit, association, or support organization? Start here
THE MOMENT THAT MATTERS
Nobody remembers the time it went perfectly.
Your customer remembers what happened when something went wrong.
The invoice that came late.The kickoff nobody confirmed.The email that went quiet for four days.
Most small businesses have an experience. Few have a designed one. The difference is simple:
A designed experience is written down.
If it only lives in your head, it's a habit. Habits hold until the week you get sick.
A designed experience happens without you.
Same result whether your week was great or terrible.
That is what you build in four steps.
THE THING YOU ACTUALLY MAKE
You leave with a map you can run.
A complete written customer experience for the customer you serve best. Not a plan to make a plan. The actual thing.
Your customer, in their words.
Who they are, what they fear, what they are trying to solve, what matters most, what frustrates them, and what would make it easier.
The whole path, start to finish.
Six stages, from the moment they find you through wrapping up or renewing. Each one has an owner, a timeline, and a signal that tells the customer what is next.
Your breaks, planned for.
For every place it can go wrong: how you will find out, who handles it, what they do, and what the customer hears.
The back end that makes it happen.
The decisions, standards, and tasks behind each step, with a name next to each one.
THE RESULT
You leave with a finished design.
Implement it yourself or hand it to someone and know exactly what to ask for.
By Design is a design program. You leave with the experience designed, not built. That is on purpose. A tool never fixed an experience. It only made whatever you were already doing happen faster.
THE METHODFour steps.
Four steps.
One map.
01
Who you're building for
Before you map anything, you get specific about who it's for. You name every type of customer you serve, answer six questions about each one in their words and not yours, and pick the one to carry forward.
YOU LEAVE WITH
A customer profile you can design around.
02
What the customer experiences
Map the front end across six stages: Find, Decide, Buy, Start, Deliver, Wrap or renew. Then map the breaks. Because the experience people remember is what you did when it did not go to plan.
YOU LEAVE WITH
Your full front-end map, including where it can go wrong and what happens when it does.
03
What makes it happen every time
This is the back end. Not tools. Not technology. You take each moment on your map and ask one question: what had to happen for that? You keep asking until you hit a decision you made, or a habit nobody ever decided.
YOU LEAVE WITH
The decisions, standards, tasks, and records behind your experience, and a clear view of where it lives only in your head.
04
Refine it
Nothing new gets added. Pressure-test what you built. Is it over-engineered? Over-simplified? What is ready to automate, and what should stay manual? A system nobody can run is just a document you feel guilty about.
YOU LEAVE WITH
A finished, runnable design, plus a list of exactly what a systems person would need from you.
AFTER THE MAP
Four Resource Guides to help you navigate what comes next after designing the process, whether you choose to do it yourself, hire someone or select the right tool.
THE RHYTHMShort class.
Short class.
Real work.
Everyone learns from everyone.
Show up for 30 minutes.
Live on Mondays at 12:30 pm ET. Short on purpose. You get the idea, then you go apply it. You'll get your login details before the first class. Can't make it live? The replay is in the cohort platform.
Do the homework.
Plan on about an hour each week. Submit it in the program platform, privately. Nobody sees it but me.
Get feedback, in the open.
Turn your homework in by noon ET on Saturday and you'll have my feedback before Monday's class. I post it in the cohort community and tag you, so you get personalized feedback and everyone learns from each other's questions and breaks. The patterns repeat more than you'd think. What you're building stays yours. My feedback is specific, and it never reveals the proprietary parts of anyone's business.
Ask your questions, and keep refining.
The community stays open for two weeks after the cohort ends. You're committing to do the work during the cohort, so those extra two weeks aren't for catching up. They're for refinement.
A GOOD FIT, NOT A PERFECT FIT
Built for owners who aren't systems people.
You don't need to be organized, technical, or "good at systems." Most people in this room aren't. That's why it's taught step by step.
THIS IS FOR YOU IF
- You run a business where the same customer interaction happens again and again.
- Things work, but mostly because you are the one making them work.
- You want repeat customers and referrals, and would like them to be less of a surprise.
- You are willing to learn this if someone shows you how, and want to ask questions along the way.
- You are just starting and do not have many customers yet. Design it first, refine it as you gain customers, then make it repeatable.
THIS IS NOT FOR YOU IF
- You want someone to build the systems for you. This program teaches you to design them.
- You are looking for a tool recommendation. Tools come last here.
FROM THE ROOM
What stuck.
Takeaways written by participants in the By Design one-hour workshop.
“Every experience has two halves.
“Taking time to examine the steps and different scenarios that contribute to the process.
“Anticipate the break, it will help avoid extra work in the long run.
THE PERSON BEHIND THE METHOD
Hi, I'm Rasheeda.
Before I posted about my money coaching business, before I took a single client, I built the process.
It was a side business. My main job was, and still is, the nonprofit I run, and I couldn't give the coaching eight hours a day. So I asked a few questions. Who am I serving? What experience do I want them to have? Where could this break? What can I automate with tools I already have?
Then I built it. Every client got tailored coaching, but the steps were the same. How I communicated, what the homework was, when it happened. So when a client referred a friend, the friend got the same great experience. Almost every client I had came from a referral.
I've been doing this for about ten years now, in my own business and at BLCK Street, where I'm the executive director. We used it to rebrand, with 83 tasks planned out over eight months for one flip date. We used it on our incubator application, where I thoroughly tested the application process before it went live. 35 people went through it. We used it on an annual conference that welcomed more than 700 attendees.
Before any of that, I spent sixteen years at Capital One, in global card payments, supplier management, supply chain, and leading an innovation center. I know what it takes for an experience to hold up when nobody is watching.
Stuff is gonna break. That's not the issue. The issue is whether you already know what you'll do when it does. That's what By Design teaches.
THE NEXT COHORT
Notify me of the next cohort.
You get the live class every Monday, homework with my feedback, four resource guides, and two weeks in the cohort community after the cohort ends.
Join the waitlist for a note when registration opens, plus a few short notes while it's open. Joining the list does not enroll you in the program.
4 Monday classes30 minutes each~1 hr weekly homework
A NOTE WHEN SIGNUP OPENS
Get a note when signup opens.
Signup isn't open yet. Leave your name and email and I'll tell you the day it is.
BEFORE YOU JOIN
Questions people ask.
Still wondering if this is for you? Write to hello@the3fiftygroup.com.
What do you mean by customer journey design?
It means deciding what customers experience as they find your business, decide to buy, work with you, and reach the end of that experience. If you call them clients, think of it as client experience design. By Design helps you make those decisions and write down what needs to happen behind the scenes so the experience is repeatable.
Do I need to be good at systems?
No. This is built for people who aren't. If you can describe how a customer works with you, you can do this. I show you how, and you can ask questions along the way.
Is 30 minutes enough?
It is, because class isn't where the work happens. Class gives you the idea. The homework is where you apply it to your business, and that's where the feedback comes in.
How much homework is there?
One piece each week, and it should take about an hour. Turn it in by noon ET on Saturday and you'll have my feedback before Monday's class.
Who sees my homework?
Only me. You submit it privately in the program platform. My feedback goes in the cohort community, where I tag you, so you get personalized feedback and everyone learns from each other. The feedback is specific, but it never reveals anything proprietary about your business. The process you're building stays private.
What if I miss a class?
The replay is available inside the cohort platform.
Do I need software or tools?
No. You'll work in documents you already have. Tools come last in this program, and only where the decisions behind them already exist.
What kind of business is this for?
Any business that serves customers, especially where the same interaction repeats. Service businesses, coaches, consultants, creatives, and product businesses with repeat buyers all fit. If you're about to have customers, even better. Design it first, then refine as you grow. Anyone running a business can take part. It isn't built around a gender, an industry, or a stage. It's built around the work.
Will you build my systems?
No. By Design teaches you to design your own customer experience. You can implement it yourself or hand it to someone. The last week covers exactly what to give them so they are not guessing.
Can my team join?
Each seat is one person. If you would like to bring By Design to your whole team or organization, see the Organizations and Workshops page.
What does it cost, and what's the refund policy?
The cohort price will be listed when the cohort opens. Cancel before the first session for a full refund. There are no refunds after the cohort begins.
When does signup open and close?
Join the waitlist to receive a reminder when registration opens for the next cohort and another before it closes.
Choose the experience before it chooses you.
Four Mondays. Thirty minutes. A customer experience you can count on.
Notify me of the next cohort