Do you love your customers?
Posted by Jason Dunstone on February 22nd, 2007 at 5:49pm
Do you love your customers? Or, more importantly, do they love you? What are their needs, wants, hopes and dreams? How do you bond with them? How can you make them more faithful?
Most government and corporate enterprises appreciate the importance of being ‘customer focused’. And, there is an understanding that recovery of a prospect is five times more expensive than keeping a regular customer. Yet how do managers acheive this? Are they truly placing customers at the forefront of their strategy and investing in better engagement?
At a work function last night when a couple of the guests worked out my profession, they were enthusiastic about the need to better understand their customers, they just didn’t see it as a strategic priority. Is it the budget, or the fear of what it may reveal? Be brave and invest in understanding your customers, put yourself up to criticism (and compliments) and practice what you preach – be customer focused.
Well designed customer surveys can be useful in monitoring performance and, most importantly, where priorities for improvement exist. Poorly developed customer research leaves the client with a wall of customer wishes to resolve with little suggestion of where to start.
Understanding customers doesn’t need to be boring, think outside the square …
- Focus groups or brainstorming sessions over lunch or drinks to opennly discuss their views
- Special ‘member only events’ to allow your staff to interact with real life customers. Ask them what they think, do, want. How can you improve your products or services. A good example of this is the Coopers Club
- Create a customer feedback blog. Be brave, your customers and potential customers will appreciate your openness. An example is Marriott Hotels
Don’t just put the ‘customer feedback’ forms on the counter and expect customers to offer their views. Engage and empower your customers in your business decision making. They will appreciate your confidence and respect, and will hopefully be more faitful.
What do you think?
- How do you currently talk to your customers?
- What are the barriers?
Posted in Imagination
Jason
Posted by David Corkindale on February 28th, 2007 at 7:49pmThe priciple of “listening to your clients” is admirable. However, you re-iterate the hoary old chestnut that ” it takes five times as much to gain a customer as to keep one.” I’d challenge you, or anyone, to come up with the figures to support this. I believe that it might come from, and maybe apply to, businesses that operate solely via Direct Marketing. I do not think that it does or can apply to other businesses.
If you think about it – what does it take to keep a client at a printers or a hairdressers? It takes good product and service delivery on a consistent basis. What does that cost? The cost of running the business very well, that is , just about all the main costs of running a business. On a per client basis one would have to divide this total cost by the number of clients but I’d suggest that this might well be greater than the cost of gaining a new client.
Also, gaining new clients is not an option – you do have keep working at it; it is a normal cost of being in business. Doing it well and efficiently is what is required. If you don’t know who they are – how do you ‘listen’ to them beforehand?