Having been in the “Customer Experience” and “Social Media/Word-of-Mouth” consulting business for more than 10 years you get a chance to see a lot of touchpoints from clients and others…thousands to be exact. Add to this the more than 500 speeches I have given and the numbers really get big. I don’t give you these stats to impress you but because even today, I am still asked the same question, “So who is doing this in my industry and what are their results from becoming a “Customer Centric/Word-of-Mouth” driven organization?”
You really want to ask me this question…again? What this is really says is, “Without the necessary data to back it up, I don’t think my company needs to become Customer Centric and deliver an incredibly awesome customer experience.” Is this what you would tell your customers if they asked you why you weren’t customer centric and delivered an awesome experience to them? I don’t think you would and unfortunately without this, Word-of-Mouth on Steroids won’t happen. Just because there isn’t a case study in your industry for your particular situation doesn’t mean it should happen. Your customers are literally waiting for this totally awesome experience so they can tell all their friends and colleagues about you…right now!
I honestly don’t believe it is because leaders really don’t care about your customers…I believe they do. And I have to believe it isn’t because they don’t want to make their customers ecstatically happy when they interact with their organizations…so it has to be something else.
CHANGE, CHANGE, CHANGE. This is the real barrier. To actually deliver this on a consistent basis requires CHANGE. People will do just about anything to avoid CHANGE. And because of this, if we weren’t already “over the top” in the experience we are delivering then this means we have to CHANGE something(s) in the organization to make this happen. Change isn’t easy and unless you have strong leadership, employees will find many other priorities and initiatives to keep this kind of change from happening.
This is where the leaders of the company need to decide how important it is to become a Customer Centric organization and take advantage of Word-of-Mouth marketing. Companies like Zappos figured this out early on and generate virtually all their marketing from Word-of-Mouth…because they made the commitment to be “over the top” customer centric and deliver a totally awesome customer experience. Here is my most favorite quote from CEO Tony Hsieh that sums it all up…
“Our whole philosophy became ‘let’s take most of the money we would’ve spent on paid advertising and paid marketing and instead of spending it on that invest it in the customer experience/customer service and then let our customers do the marketing for us through word of mouth’ and that became the whole business model.”
To get to this enviable position takes focus, effort, and a commitment to want to CHANGE. This is where your competition retreats because they know it requires CHANGE and this is uncomfortable. This is your chance as a leader in your industry. Rather than asking for another case study or report or research by some big research/consulting organization, this is your chance to just make it happen. This is your chance to take a leadership role in your organization and your industry. This is your chance to lead and dominate. Are you up for the challenge?
Have I hit that nerve that says, “Dang he nailed it and this is exactly why we don’t do it and we need to do it.” If so, let me leave you with one thing that might motivate you to rethink your current situation. If you do decide to CHANGE…your customers will not only LOVE YOU but they will go out of their way to be your ADVOCATE and TELL EVERYONE how AWESOME you are and why they should do business with you. Is this result worth the pain of change? If you believe it is…and it has proven out for many very successful companies, you won’t need another case study to prove this is the right direction to head. And you will be well ahead of your competition…because they won’t want to CHANGE!!
