Good to great: Becoming an irresistible business

Could you become the business your customers can’t live without? Mat Wylie shows you how.

Every time we go to a business we go with an expectation of certain standards. If it’s a café, we expect the coffee and food to taste good, and the employees should be polite, if not friendly. You know that your dentist is qualified and should provide good dental care. Vets need to be good with animals and be qualified to solve pet health problems – at the very least.

But here’s the problem: “Good” really isn’t good enough these days – especially in potentially tough economic times.

If you want to retain customers and attract new ones, you need to be great.

Why aim for great?

Think of your own experiences. We’ll go out of our way to support a business that treats us well – and we won’t go back to those that leave us underwhelmed. We come back to businesses even if they’re a little more expensive. We refer those businesses to others. We post great feedback online.

It costs a business up to 25 times more to get a new customer than to retain an existing one. Plus, customers are happy to pay more if they feel like they’ve received value in return.

In fact, data from more than six million pieces of customer feedback, across multiple industries, showed that happy customers are less likely to mention price in their feedback.

In comparison, when customers are unhappy with the service, price becomes a bigger issue.

You don’t need to re-engineer your business, but there are small things you could do that will help you improve the customer experience, drive more referrals, and help your business thrive.

Aim for small changes

Providing a great experience doesn’t mean overhauling your whole business. It could be as simple as sending a text message to let your customers know you are running behind schedule. Or making sure your team knows how to handle a customer complaint. For one business we work with, they received some customer feedback that it felt like the wait times were too long. Although they couldn’t instantly speed up the wait, they made one small change which immediately improved the customer experience: simply offering customers a biscuit while they waited.

The goal is evolution, not revolution. You’re looking for those one-percent improvements that will take you from good to great and encourage people to tell a positive story about you.

Which one-percent change would make the biggest difference in your business?

Start thinking like a customer

One of our team recently went for an X-ray. The technician was perfectly professional, qualified, and did exactly what they needed to do technically. But every time they touched her, they didn’t give her a heads up. And every time, it gave her a fright.

They forgot that communicating what was going to happen would have made the experience less anxiety-inducing. They were good, but that little change could have made them great.

Put yourself in your customers’ shoes and take a look at your business with fresh eyes. What would turn customers away from your business, and what tiny change could you make that would prevent that?

What will take you from good to great?

Running a business is hard, and often overwhelming – so I get why figuring out what to change might be in the ‘too hard basket’.

But here’s the good news – you don’t need to make the decision. Don’t know which tiny change to make? Ask your customers. They’ll tell you what they like and don’t like.

So, if you want to ensure price is a non-issue, become the business your customers can’t live without, and handle any challenges that the economy throws your way, it might be time to go from good to great – and your customers will be the ones that tell you how.

www.customerradar.com