The one thing that customers want above everything else is to succeed. So whatever else we do we must ensure their success with our product or service. They will likely forgive us many things so long as they taste the sweet hormone rush of succeeding at what they were trying to do in the first place.
Intuitively we know this and the latest avalanche of neuroscience confirms it. In his book The Winner Effect, cognitive neuroscientist Ian Robertson offers the summary, “Success and failure shape us more powerfully than genetics and drugs.”
It escapes me why any businesses think that customer service is waiting for customers to fail first. Then expecting them to contact an (“Our operators are all busy providing wonderful help to other customers”) ‘help’ desk. Or asking them to trawl through endless FAQs, in the hope that someone has already failed for the exact same reason!
It may well be that making people happy on their ‘customer journey’ whilst we are in the process of delivering products or services will help them become favourably disposed towards us. However if they crash and burn at the last hurdle do we really expect they will dust off their grazed knees and come back for more?
The risk is wasting all our energy and resource providing wow-inducing treats along the way whilst losing sight of the primary goal.
Imagine though, if from the very first interaction, our focus is helping them succeed. It follows that the things we say and do will strongly signal we are part of their team. Those of you who have experienced success within a team will know the bonds of loyalty that this can create.
So become part of your customer’s team. Learn to create trust by seeking to understand rather than to be understood. Perhaps, instead of spending time and energy finding ways to get your customers to love you, you should simply love them? Chances are, they will love you back.
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