Zach Hardison is VP of Innovation at Questline Digital, a marketing and technology agency that builds engaging experiences for utilities.
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Being customer-centric is not a new trend or even a new idea, but it is increasingly harder to achieve. You can fault turnover or perhaps a history of starts and stops, but honestly, the biggest obstacle is often the uniqueness of people. Customers’ habits, interests and wants are constantly changing because of technology, finances, lifestyle and myriad other reasons. They expect you to keep up and will certainly let you know if you fall behind.
If you’re all in on being customer-centric, make sure you understand that there is no end date to this goal; you simply evolve, grow and continue onward. With that, here are three things that are pivotal to being successful.
Be Clear, Concise And Tangible In Your Reasoning
Whether you’re revitalizing an existing pillar around customer centricity or creating a brand-new one, sooner or later someone is going to ask, “What does it mean for our organization to be customer-centric?” If you want to be successful in your goals, you’d better have a short, easy-to-understand answer and be prepared to go into the details.
Realistically, people are generally looking for two things when they ask that question:
• What metric do you want to improve?
• How are you planning to improve it?
Unfortunately, I’ve seen many leaders try to answer what it means for their organization to be customer-centric by elaborating on why being customer-centric is important. The first mistake here is that it doesn’t answer the actual question, and furthermore, no one needs to be sold on the why. Everyone immediately knows and believes it’s important; they want their leadership to come out with the how—they want the details and the plan.
Here’s a great example of how I’ve seen an organization answer that question:
“One way our organization aims to be customer-centric is to achieve above a 95% first-call resolution rate in our contact center. We’re going to look at our phone tree, our automated intake, the software our reps use, and our in-house training and make investments and changes across the board to achieve our goal. When we do, we will have elevated the customer experience when they call us with a question.”
Go Top To Bottom And Inside To Outside
Once you have determined your organization’s goals and success metrics for customer-centricity, it’s time to create your communications plan. You can also call this your “change management” plan because I can tell you that not everyone is going to be on board with it. And if you want real, lasting success, then that means you want real, lasting change.
First and foremost, your most senior leaders have got to buy in before you start communicating broadly throughout your organization. They are your most powerful influencers, and it’s going to show later if you don’t take the time upfront to make sure they are confident and comfortable with the direction.
Beyond knowing the talking points and evangelizing them to their teams, some leaders will need new investment, resources or increased authority to turn their customer-centric goals into realities. These challenges can work in your favor, though, when you speak candidly and publicly about them. Resolving them head-on gives you another opportunity to back up your commitment.
After your senior leaders are confident and ready to carry the message forward, they can begin having conversations with their own teams and so on throughout your organization. It’s important to know that the broader the audience, the more details you need to have on hand. Ultimately, you will be changing how your front line operates from day to day, which means they’re likely going to bring tough questions for you to answer. Be ready for them.
When do you tell your customers, issue a press release or cue the billboards and display ads? The answer is after everyone in your organization has heard the message and had a chance to ask questions.
Go Beyond The Surface Level
Everyone has their own personal portfolio of great customer experiences they keep filed away. Of course, there are the heavy-hitters like USAA and Disney, but those portfolios also include the restaurants, salons, retail stores and coffee shops that get people coming back because of their service. All this to say that many people are great at detecting when a customer-centric initiative is a mile wide and an inch deep.
It’s table stakes to greet your customer by their first name, digitally or in person. (You’re doing this, right?) If you want to be customer-centric, then you need to go deeper, and that means getting to know your customers. Skip the small talk and start a relationship that caters to their interests. Thankfully, there’s a surefire way to do this. Talk to them.
Find out what they like and make recommendations based on that info. Give them clear ways to tell you about problems they’re experiencing, listen to them, make concerted efforts to resolve the issue and follow up to show you’re committed. Do you have a product or service you want to launch next quarter? Are you confident it’s one that your customers truly want?
You can ask, test, learn and iterate your way to success with your customers. If you approach them honestly and with humility, I think you’ll find that so many people are happy and eager to help create a better experience. They will likely feel proud to be included in the solution, and you get to create something you know they want.
Across multiple industries, every customer I’ve ever spoken with for the purpose of feedback and discovery has given me pages of notes. If you’re smart about it, they will give you all the information you need to create the ideal customer experience.
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