Abstract

The case is about Walt Disney World (Disney) in Orlando, Florida. Over the years, Disney had been focusing on improving customers’ experience at its parks and various other attractions. It had taken care of minutest details to ensure the comfort and entertainment of customers and had always updated its services to match the changing environment. Moving in alignment with its focus, in 2013, Disney launched a vacation management system, MyMagic+ (MM+), which could streamline its parks’ operations and enhance customer experience. The MM+ system had three components — the My Disney Experience website, a mobile app, and the technology driven devices, MagicBands. The case focuses on the benefits and drawbacks of this MM+ system. From the customers’ perspective, the MM+ system offered a comfortable all-in-one radio-frequency identification device, MagicBands, which could deliver a more enjoyable and well-planned Walt Disney World experience, whereas for Disney, the system could track the visitors’ movements and thus help in generating a vast database. However, concerns were raised about the possibility of the model succeeding in future. Analysts studied these technology driven devices and their working and expressed concern over the possibility of the bands being cloned or the information being retrieved by smartphones. Questions were raised on whether the use of these bands would jeopardize the privacy and security of the personal and financial information of customers. Although Disney tried to put these doubts to rest, the MM+ being a project in its trial phase could not guarantee success in the coming days. Further, analysts were skeptical about customers’ willingness to enjoy the Disney services, while putting information valuable to them at risk.

Learning Objectives

The case is structured to achieve the following Learning Objectives:

• Understanding how Disney was trying to leverage digital technology to enhance customer experience.
• Understanding the various practices of service quality management and how the MagicBands can be helpful in managing service quality at Disney.
• Discussing the concept of customer database, data warehousing, and data mining in line with the Disney MyMagic+ system.
• Examining how customer data could help in segmenting customer market.
• Discussing and debating whether the new technology driven customer service could actually be beneficial in long run. Listing out the pros and cons of MM+ system for Disney and its visitors.

Keywords

Leverage digital technology to enhance customer experience, Vacation management system, RFID technology, Customer service, Service quality management, Service innovation, Customer database, Data warehousing, Data mining, Self-service technologies, Monitoring systems, Customer Experience Management, Ethical implications of technology-driven customer service, Privacy, Security