4 posts tagged “customer”

One of the principles that guides me in my work is the principle of "My way or the better way". I have repeated this to my peers, my reports, my bosses, my customers .... What I mean by this is that I love feedback on my ideas so that we can collectively make it better. I am not looking for the credit that it was my idea - why? Because our customers who are outside our building do not really care whose idea it is. I tell my colleagues and direct reports that either all of us are going to look like heroes if we collectively solve the customer's problems in the best possible way or look like a bunch of idiots in front of customers. Egos and credits as to who solved the problem does not matter from the customer's perspective. Customers are holding only your company as the responsible and accountable entity and not individual employees of the company.

I have encouraged my peers, my direct reports to constantly challenge my ideas or suggestions so that we can make sure we have looked at a problem from all perspectives and then designed the best possible solutions. All that matters is what "we" (not "I") have done for the customer.

I hope the title got enough of your attention. Yes, I mean it. If you want to develop great products, solutions, services that will solve your customer's problems, don't talk to customers. Listen to them. Your customers are tired of being talked to. They would love if someone listened to them for a change. Your sales people are talking to them, your competition is talking to them, everyone is touting to them about their greatest products since sliced bread. If you take the time to stop talking and instead listen, there is a strong chance that you would be able to find what the customer is exactly trying to tell you.

Last month, I visited the local Yankee Candle store to buy some gifts for our friends. I walked in and I was greeted by a very friendly sales person. I told her that I was a looking for a candle jar. She said "Oh you mean a housewarmer". I was confused or I should say a little embarassed. I thought I probably did not know what this thing is called. I went on to tell her that I was looking to give these as gifts to my friend. She then asked me if I needed a housewarmer or tarts or votives or a combination of these. I thought she was speaking in Greek to me. To me they were big candles, small candles, even smaller candles. I left the store after making my purchase thinking that I was not probably the market segment that Yankee Candle was targeting?

I had forgotten about this incident, until I ended up at the Voice of the Customer conference here in San Diego. Yankee Candle was a sponsor at the conference and they had one of these small so called housewarmers for everyone in the audience. Rick Ruffolo, their Vice President was a featured speaker and I listened to him speak about how Yankee Candle listens to their customers. So I decided to do a test.

I picked the "housewarmer" candle I had and asked many women who were in the audience as to what they would call this thing (after all, if my hypothesis that men are not the target market segment for Yankee Candle, why not ask the women). Does anyone want to guess what they called it - Candle Jar or Jar Candle. Now I know I was on to something.

So I decided to Google "Candle Jar" and see whether Yankee Candle would be listed. Not in the first 5 "natural search" listings and not in the first 5 sponsored links.

So here is a company that is supposedly listening to customers, missing out on customers who are now doing business on the web. Their competitors are listed at the top of the search and they are winning business away from Yankee Candle.

Why does this happen? For a simple reason - even well established companies forget to speak the customer's language. It is not enough to listen to customers just at the front end of market research. You ought to have the voice of the customer guide you in everything you do. Even naming your products or features in your products should follow the customer's language. This has become more important with the advent of the internet because the way people buy has changed. If your product does not get found when customers search on the internet, they will not buy.

A company can sure choose to brand something, but it takes millions of dollars to create a brand. What would you rather do - spend those millions to create a brand or choose to speak the language of the customer and have your products found. Hope Yankee Candle Company marketing folks are listening !!

Next week, I am going to be at the Voice of the Customer conference in San Diego. This would be my second trip to San Diego. I was there just for a night last time I was there and I was impressed by the city. I will be there for 5 days this time and hopefully will get to see more of the city.

I am going to be speaking at the conference on a topic that I remains my passion - listening to customers to solve their needs. The topic of my presentation is "Voice of the customer: Who is listening?". I am on the third (or was it the fourth or the fifth) draft of my presentation and I don't think I am there yet. I will post the slides once I am done. But if you need the presentation, then you need me. I am looking forward to my presentation and also in learning from other presentations.