Читать книгу 99 Marketing Mistakes - Kenyon Blunt - Страница 11

Mistake #5

Not Focusing On Your Customers

I remember hearing the phrases, “The customer is king,” or “The customer is always right” as soon as I got into the business world. Having catch-phrases like these don’t mean that you are customer-focused; it’s a lot easier making these statements than doing them. Your small business needs to take it one step further and turn this focus into action.

How Small Businesses Lose Focus

There are several ways business owners let customers down. Here are four that I see regularly:

1 Not keeping promises – Many small businesses make guarantees to their customers in terms of faster service or quality products. A study done by the American Marketing Association showed that 35 percent of respondents said companies didn’t keep these promises to customers.

2 Poor service and communication – the failed promises could be as simple as poor service and unresponsiveness.

3 Not soliciting feedback – It’s hard to be customer-focused if you don’t ask customers how you’re doing. Top performing companies take advantage of customer feedback twice as much as lower-performing businesses. See mistake #15 for more.

4 Not focusing on employees – Companies that fail on promises to employees also fail on delivering to customers. The two are interdependent.

Focusing on Your Customers Is Essential

In a survey by 4Salesforce, “customer satisfaction” was the number one marketing metric for small businesses. When customers are satisfied, they buy again, and repeat sales are the lifeblood of small businesses. Your customers want you to alleviate their pain. When you’re able to do this, this focus leads to a clear differentiation with competitors. And that leads to repeat sales.

How to Focus on Your Customers

Focusing on your customers is an excellent first step, but it doesn’t stop there. You need to make your customers successful. There are a few things I like to do:

 Think strategically about their business. Step back from your daily grind and think about how your customers and prospects spend their time. What problems do they have now and in the future?

 Listen to your customers. Actively solicit your customers’ opinions on how you’re doing. Use a survey such as NPS (Net Promoter Score) to measure the customer experience.

 Solve customer problems. Know enough about your customer’s business that you can find their pain and solve their problems.

 Manage customer relationships. Managing your customer relationships requires a single, unified view of each customer or prospect so you can then reach out to them at the right time with the right message. You’ll probably need a CRM (customer relationship management) system to do this.

 Go above and beyond. Excellent customer service is table stakes in today’s competitive environment. You must not settle for “good enough.” Instead, aspire to a level of service that is truly memorable.

 Invest in employees. Invest in training for your employees. Look for ways to educate them about the industry and build their skills so they can better serve your customers.

 Keep improving. Always be looking for product and service improvements. Encourage an open feedback loop with customers.

4 https://www.salesforce.com/