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No matter what business you are in, it is client (or customer) satisfaction that is the barometer that indicates things to come. Just as a true barometer measures air pressure, a business satisfaction barometer measures customer pressure. If customer satisfaction is low the customers will be pressing for better service, and you can expect some nasty weather ahead for your business. If customer satisfaction is high the pressure will be off, and you will see sunny days for your business.
A highly satisfied customer will stay with you much longer than one that finds your product and/or service to be just average. It is pretty easy to find average service or products to replace yours. It is not easy to find service or products that are highly satisfying, mostly because managing customer satisfaction is not very well understood by many businesses. The title “Customer Satisfaction Manager” isn’t found on many business cards.
Many businesses react with wonderment if they hear a customer complaint. It is an automatic reaction to be a little defensive of your efforts, as in “How could these customers not know how hard we work at this business!”. Worse yet would be “Don’t these customers understand that we are the experts at this!”. The answer to the first question is that the customer doesn’t care how hard you work, they care how well you are meeting their needs, period. In answer to the second question, if you are doing a poor job of meeting the customer’s needs then they don’t care if you are the “Einstein” in your field of business. To repeat, the customer cares how well you are meeting their needs.
It is most important to understand what your customer’s needs really are. Sometimes they aren’t very good at expressing those needs. You might need to listen very carefully. An example would be a customer at a car repair facility. Let’s say this repair facility has the most highly trained technicians and the best equipment and facilities available. Their record is one of superb mechanical work. The customer comes in and explains the problem with the car, and mentions in passing that he needs the car back later that day for a short trip he has planned.
The expert technician starts the required repairs using the best equipment and tools available to the industry. It is amazing to see the level of precision in this technician’s work. He should have been a brain surgeon with the dexterity he demonstrates. While the repair took a little longer than expected, it is the best repair job ever done to an automobile!
The problem is that the customer is absolutely livid because he missed his meeting with the president of the company that was going to hire him at twice his current pay. Because the repair facility employees didn’t listen to his needs he is going to lose an enormous opportunity! So what was the most important need here and what did the customer really care about? Was it the repairs to the car or assured transportation to his meeting? Would improving the method of repairs or buying better equipment bring this customer back? I doubt it.
What would bring customers like this back is a demonstration of listening skills and a caring attitude that is amply demonstrated by every employee. An old saying goes “People don’t care what you know until they know that you care”. My bet is that the customer illustrated above would have been very satisfied with an average repair job if he had gotten his vehicle back in time. The lesson here is that if you see customer satisfaction levels declining, instead of simply working harder at what you do try listening very closely to the customer so you can identify the true need. Simply expressing the fact that you care about their needs can be more powerful than the best equipment or technical skills.
At Rental Research Services our business has grown a great deal through word-of-mouth advertising from highly satisfied clients. We have listened to the needs of the clients constantly as we developed our easy to use, yet very sophisticated online resident screening products. The average amount of time that a client has been doing business with us is more than 10 years, because they are highly satisfied with both our products and our service. You could say the business barometer indicates some pretty sunny weather for our business.
If you ever have a concern, or an idea of how we could better meet your needs, please contact us. We care! |
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Client satisfaction is the key to business success, and people skills are the key to client satisfaction. |
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“If customer satisfaction is high the pressure will be off, and you will see sunny days for your business.” |
