Archive for August, 2008

Since leading/managing your business, you’ve realized that no two customers/clients are exactly the same. Unfortunately, that can lead you to be taken advantage of by people who then claim that you must therefore market to everyone as well as market the same way to everyone. The result: your marketing budgets will be considerable and measuring your outcomes will be unruly. 

But, fear not! You can always segment — that is, split your customers/clients into smaller groups — and then market to these smaller groups. The resulting benefits are considerable: you can build a better understanding of these smaller groups’ needs, priorities, purchase behaviours and obstacles to purchase. At the same time, you can hone your marketing budgets and collect meaningful measures.

Keep in-mind that when you decide to segment, the challenge then becomes: How do you develop meaningful segments? Robert and I delve into this topic in a future BusinessCast Podcast.

But, before we tackle how you can/should segment your customers/clients, here’s a fun and thought-provoking example that gives you a flavour of one way to segment a specific group of consumers.

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But, here’s another reason: According to a new study, affluent consumers – i.e. the customers you want – are using social media tools to share their customer service experiences as well as to learn about the “care experiences” of others during the purchase decision making process. This is among the initial findings in new study by the Society for New Communications Research entitled, Exploring the Link Between Customer Care and Brand Reputation in the Age of Social Media.  

These findings emphasize that how you treat your current customers has a dramatic impact on new business as well as repeat business.

The study examined affluent/active Internet users and how “customer care” influences brand reputation — given the widespread use of social media tools (e.g. podcasts, blogs, etc.). 

The top findings — summarized below — strongly suggest that every entrepreneur needs to focus time, energy and resource on ensuring that current (and future) customers have consistent positive customer experiences:

• 59 % of respondents use social media to “vent” about a customer care experience
• 72 % of respondents research companies’ customer care online prior to purchasing products and services at least sometimes
• 84% of respondents consider the quality of customer care at least sometimes in their decision to do business with a company
• 74% choose companies/brands based on others’ customer care experiences shared online
• 84% of respondents consider the quality of customer care in their decision to do business with a company at least sometimes
• 81% believe that blogs, online rating systems and discussion forums can give consumers a greater voice regarding customer care, but less than 33% believe that businesses take customers’ opinions seriously 

Dell and Amazon were cited more often than any other company when asked which companies have done the best job in using social media tools to respond to customer care issues. 

In terms of industry segments, technology, retail, and travel companies were reported as doing the best job, while utilities, health care, and insurance were the least likely to receive positive endorsements.

The researchers conclude that the “…most savvy and sought-after consumers will not support companies with poor customer care reputations and, they will talk about all of this openly with others via multiple online vehicles”.

By the way, if you’re trying to get your head around social media – don’t feel discouraged, you’re not alone. Check out our blog entries on July 30th and July 31st – for a quick overview and some very useful resources.

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Customer Experience. It is one of the most critical components of your brand and it makes or breaks your business.

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Like every entrepreneur, you know the importance of creating a strong and positive first impression — whether your goal is to build new business, attract staff, intrigue investors or entice business partners.

The truth is that first impressions are lasting impressions. Once they are established, first impressions are incredibly difficult to alter — particularly if those impressions are not favourable.

So, making a good first impression is always important. Given that reality, it is essential that your reception area – which most often creates the first impression - shapes the right impression. In other words, this physical space and the experience that people have in it must reinforce something special and positive about your business.

Unfortunately, entrepreneurs typically set up the reception area based on the functional need of the operations (i.e. separating where the work is done from the ‘rest of the world’) as opposed to thinking about this area from a visitor’s perspective. And, because people have an incredible ability to adapt to the physical environment, entrepreneurs quickly lose their ability to ‘see’ their reception area through the eyes of someone who is new to their place of business.

To overcome this high-risk-laden ‘blindness’ — entrepreneurs can take a very simple step before jumping into the expense of initiating a well-meaning ‘reception makeover’: ask your visitors.

Specifically, ask your visitors for their first impressions of how they felt and what they thought of you, your colleagues and your firm once they walked into your reception area. Make sure that you probe to make sure that they’re not candy-coating their responses. And, ask what specifically about the physical space gave them their most positive and negative perceptions. You should also ask how they spent their time in the reception area (i.e. sitting, standing, pacing, reading magazines, speaking to the receptionist, etc.). This can highlight opportunities for you to create a positive experience by taking simple steps by providing current/relevant literature, training the receptionist to engage with visitors, etc. Finally, ask how their impressions and experiences compares to those when they spend time in the reception areas of your competitors or other places of business.

You have a reception area. It should be working for you. And, there is an infinite number of ways that you can shape your visitors’ impressions. But, if your reception is not working to help build a strong and positive impression you are ultimately doing your business a disservice — a disservice that is difficult to remedy once that first impression is established.

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It takes considerable time, effort and resource to land a client — regardless of your product or service offering. So, you’d never think of dumping a client/customer – or would you? Or more importantly, should you? There are some very real reasons that you need to fire some clients – the sooner the better.

But, when should you fire a client? How do you do it without gaining a reputation for being difficult? And, how do you know that you’ve made the right choice?

Robert and I tackle these thorny issues in the BusinessCast Podcast #45 – Firing a Client Before You Get Burned. This episode will provide you with some practical steps so that you can feel confident when you are put in that difficult position of needing to sever the relationship with a customer/client who, while they may be paying your fees, is actually doing your business more harm than good.

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