What Do Customers Want?

I felt a wry smile creep across my face when I read that the airline industry has just unveiled a "Customers First" program. This effort is reported to be a public relations response to stave off Federal legislation. Both houses of Congress have introduced bills called "passenger bill of rights" in reaction to airline customers’ enormous dissatisfaction with carriers. I was smiling at the thought that legislation would solve the problems.

But it is a wake up call to every business that customers are so disgruntled that they want legislative relief from those who provide products and services to them. The problem of how to please customers is not unique to the airline industry. Customer problems plague every industry. Customer relationships are floundering and customer satisfaction is plummeting, even in new media.

But why are customers so dissatisfied? Today’s marketplace produces innovative products and services, cutting edge solutions to old problems, rapid turnaround, and highly competitive costs. What in the world do customers want in addition to that?

The answer is obvious.

In addition to the products and services that they purchase, customers want a good relationship. In my career I have been both a customer who purchased product and service, and an employee responsible for providing customer service. My own experience has taught me that if a company wants to be successful it will need to build good customer relationships as much as good products.

The economy abounds with choice, creating a competitive environment that gives customers many options for comparable products and services. In a discontented marketplace the intangibles become significant differentiators. It is very important to understand what customers want and then give it to them. That is how the marketplace works for successful products, and that is how successful customer relationships will be forged.

So, what do customers want?

They want the core components of any successful relationships: truth, communication, and courtesy.

Customers value the truth more than anything in their business relationships. They want the truth, regardless of whether it is good news or bad news. The complication is that companies typically do not want to tell customers the truth, especially if it is bad news. It seems as if companies view their customers as one dimensional, and fear that errors or mistakes will always be fatal to the relationship. This is a sad mistake.

I have had to deliver some very, very bad news to high-profile customers. It has been my experience that customers are remarkably tolerant. They typically will work with you to solve problems, if the problems are acknowledged in a forthright manner. Of course, customers may vent their frustration -- they are not paying to have problems created – but customers do accept that errors and problems will occur. Given an opportunity, they often will provide invaluable help in making a good resolution.

Telling customers the truth does not mean that bad news cannot be presented in the best possible light. An advantageous presentation of the facts is no crime or breach of ethics. It is common sense and good business. Customers expect a general explanation of how the problem occurred, a reasonable solution for how it will be corrected, and assurance that it will not happen again. They do not want the sordid, internal details of the failure.

But they do want the truth, and not some made up story. There is nothing more harmful to good customer relationships than lies. A lie is a fatal error. Customers will forget mistakes but they will never forget, or forgive, lies.

Customers absolutely hate not being informed. It infuriates them. A communication vacuum blows everything out of proportion. Lack of information breeds anxiety, suspicion, and resentment. It needlessly creates mistrust.

The primary customer complaint about communication, regardless of industry or product, is the timeliness of information. Actions like dodging phone calls and ignoring voice mail messages, e-mails or faxes, are destructive practices that will drive customers to the competition faster than producing a poor product.

Keep customers informed. Tell them what they should know before they find out in the worst possible way, on their own.

It is not possible to be too courteous to customers. The rapid pace of business, the encroachment of competition, the shifting dynamics and changing goals, makes courtesy seem old fashioned, even an anachronism in a modern economy.

Just the opposite is really true. Customers receive so little courtesy in modern business that it is coveted and highly prized. Nothing brings a greater Return on Investment (ROI) than courtesy to customers. An extra please, thank you, good morning, a kind word, and a pleasant tone of voice, are the foundation of good customer relationships.

Courtesy is the most underutilized weapon against competition in the marketplace. Think about how positive you feel when someone is especially courteous to you. You notice it, you like it, and you remember it. Courtesy works like that in business. It is a powerful tool that generates a strong reserve of good will.

Always give customers good work. Insist that others in your company give customers good work. But do not forget to also give them what they want, and what they likely may not be able to get from the competition: a good relationship.

Copyright © 1998, 1999 by D.E. Summerville. All rights reserved.

The advice and suggestions in the Women in Business column are solely those of the author. DC Web Women assumes no responsibility for its content.

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