How Listening to Customers Grows Your Business (2024)

Welcome to episode 49 of Season 2 of Baktari MD! In this episode, we go over how to avoid making your customer feel like a widget and how to actually, genuinely listen to them. What are the benefits of this? All of the tips and tricks you need are right here! Find out all of this and more in the full episode! 

Transcript

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The phrase I like to use is make sure you don't treat your customers like a widget. Hi. Welcome to another episode of Baktari MD. As you know, this season we're doing Crash CEO School, where we go over all the skill sets you need to grow your organization to be an effective leader. Today, what I want to talk about is listening to your customers. And by that I mean really listening to them and using that information to make your, business grow and be dynamic. Now, listening to your customer is a very interesting phenomenon because on some level, who doesn't listen to their customer, but I'm talking about literally listening to your customers in a meaningful way that impacts your business. I think when people think about listening to their customer, I think they feel that sometimes there may be competing goals because certainly you don't want your customers to be telling you how to run your business or altering how you do business. But on the flip side is you want to make sure you attend their needs and wants. So how do you learn to make listening to your customer be a priority to be important in your corporate culture? And in this video I'm going to go over how to do that. And I'm going to show you how you can instill this as part of your corporate culture. By the end of this video, you should have a firm handle on some of the leadership steps you will need to take to make this a priority in your organization. So let's step back and and just start from the beginning. First of all, to have a corporation where the customer is a priority is not as easy as it sounds. And it has to come from the top. So let's get that out of the way. If only people at the bottom are concerned, or it's just a priority for people who are actually dealing with the clients or the customers, that may not be effective. The the, the the importance of listening to your customer is really, really important. And that has got to start from the top. And you know what The phrase I like to use is make sure you don't treat your customers like a widget. If your customers are a widget, and if that's the message that people on top send. I think it's easy for customers to often realize they're being treated as a number that just there's just one more sale, one more person. So let's get it out of the way. If the people on top have that attitude, I would say it will permeate the organization, because during meetings and opportunities to improve things, that will not be a priority. So we're going to talk about how to not to do that, but let's understand that the people on top have to send the message that we are going to, let our customers speak to us, give us feedback, and we're going to use that information to get better. And we're always going to try to get better by getting that feedback and understanding their needs and wants. So, the flip side, before we go further is what you don't want to happen is you don't want your customers to necessarily be dictating how you run your business, where you get so much feedback that everything they say you're going to make a change, they're going to, you know, if they criticize you about the price, you're going to lower the price. If they don't like how you, do the process, the how you deliver your services, what hours you're open, you can't on some level let customers dictate that to you. But the flip side is you also need to take feedback and then incorporate that into your decision making. So getting back to the actual, actionable things you can do to listen to your customers. The first thing is, whatever your processes are, and however you do business, you have to listen to your customers and understand their needs and wants. And you have to get to know them. Before anything can be done. You have to convey that you understand what their needs and wants are, and every interaction has to be unique. Now, you may have a process and you may even have a script that you go through, but that doesn't mean you don't listen to the feedback you're getting to those scripts or to those processes. Once you understand that even though you have a process, there are times where people have unique concerns and unique issues that your normal process doesn't address, or your product doesn't really help out. So having said that, the first thing is you have to understand is that every customer has to be treated uniquely, even if you're the process you're putting them through is pretty much cut and dry. And that's, you know, you rinse and repeat. You have to be prepared to understand their needs and wants and concerns that might be unique. The number two thing is, just because you have a product or service doesn't mean that that product and service is going to match the needs and wants of that client. So often I see people trying to sell because that's what they have, but they're not listening, and that actually what they're selling doesn't meet the needs and wants of the person they have on the phone or sitting in front of them. And your ability to communicate that, you know, what we have doesn't sound like a right fit for you, will go a long way to getting a customer for life when they do need your product or service. The next step that I always tell my staff, as you're listening to your client or the customer, is put yourself in their shoes and look at it from their perspective. Doesn't mean we're going to agree and and be able to help everybody or give them what they want. But this ability to understand where the client is coming from, to commiserate with them, to understand their issues goes a long ways. Because sometimes, even if you don't have the product they need by you simply listening to them, you can refer them to the right place or even to a competitor that in itself has value and needs. So understanding that your customer is really the person that really is the most important thing in these interactions allows you to have a a customer base focus. Now, I've talked to a lot of CEOs and leaders who say, yes, we're customer base because that's what I feel. But you know what? They're not the ones necessarily answering every phone call or going to every meeting. And so I think the best way to handle that is don't believe that everybody has your attitude. One of the most interesting things, I tell people is have a mechanism that you can survey your customers in a relatively anonymous way, whether you send them an email on how you did, or some other way to survey. Because what you will find if you survey every customer, whether use a third party or what have you, you'll be shocked to what you will hear about interactions that they have had with some staff that is is probably worth you knowing about. That and the other thing is potentially recording the phone calls, obviously with permission, because I think, you know, when you hear this thing, this call will be recorded for quality control. I think that's part of why a lot of companies do it. If you really want to be shocked, potentially what you're some of your staff is saying and some of these phone calls, you have to hear some of them so you can understand the some of the frustrations from customers or clients when they're not really being heard. eNational Testing makes getting a simple laboratory test as easy as ordering something online. With three simple steps, you can have your test ordered for STDs, general health, allergy testing, diabetes screening, blood titers, and more! You can simply go in for testing the same day and get your results quickly to your email. eNationalTesting.com’s complete health care panels come with easy to understand results at over 2700 locations nationwide. It's time to focus on yourself. eNationalTesting.com; easy, convenient and tailored to your health needs. So, you know, I'm probably have lost some of you in terms of what does this mean? You're not being heard. But I want to give you some examples that I've recently seen and throughout my years I see. And that is where the staff basically has a process. And no matter what the person says, it doesn't change what they regurgitate or say as the process. I'll give you a, an example. Recently I called a company and I was ordering a very special, unique item that had to be ordered from the manufacturer, and it's supposed to come in four weeks. I called the company back after eight weeks. They said, oh, there's been a holdup. It's going to be another four weeks until the manufacturer can get around to making it, which was fine. I get that I'm okay. I'm in no rush. And I asked the person, so let me ask you a question. If it's going to be manufactured in four weeks, when should I expect to get it? And instead of saying, well, if it's manufactured in four weeks and then it takes two weeks to get to us, so you might get it in seven weeks. The person just repeated what he says goes, well, like I said, it's going to be manufactured in four weeks. I guess I know that, but I guess, the information I wanted is fine. We accept that will be manufactured in four weeks, but when will I actually may have it in my hand? And I get it. He didn't want to commit because there are already been delays. But a simple answer like I can't promise you. But if they do manufacture it in four weeks, you know, then we'll get it in two weeks. You'll get it in seven weeks. But I think, I think this idea that I don't really want to understand what the customer is really getting. I’ll give you another example. I went to a dentist office, and I was half hour late and they said, you're half hour late. You'll just have to wait whenever your turn is. I said, fine, no problem. I'm willing to wait. Then I went up the lady a half hour later. I said, no problem. I know I'm going to wait, but I want to know roughly when a range of time that you think I might be seen, because I may have to reschedule some other appointments. and again, she just repeated the policy. If you're late, you simply have to wait, and we fit you in. And I think I got that. I was willing to do that, but my question wasn't that my question really was, given that I have to wait, is there a range of time one hour, two hours, three hours that you could see potentially that I will get squeezed in. Again, these are examples of the person simply repeating their process and not really trying to understand, what is the customer really asking me? And when we record our phone calls from our staff, of course, you know, 95%, 99% of staff. I'm very fortunate. you know, our do it, but sometimes we have new staff or new people and there and I don't think it comes from a bad place. I think it's just they're they're new and they they've been taught that this is our policy and procedure, and all they can do is repeat the policy and procedure that we have and not listen to the client. And I think that's when the client feels like they're a widget. Right. You feel like you're a widget. You feel like you're just going through the process, that you're just one more client and people are not listening to your question. Actually, what you what you want to know. You've heard what they've said, but you want some clarity on that. And what happens is when a culture happens like that, when when people, don't necessarily listen to the specific concerns of the client, the clients eventually figure out that, that this is obviously a business, but it's a business that, they're not a priority. Yes. More than happy to take your money for the product or service, but they're not sitting there trying to figure out how they can address any concerns you have. Now, obviously, if you have a big organization and hopefully, you know, 95% of people are doing it right, but the goal is to even help the 5% who are new maybe have not had the proper training. and so part of part of this CEO and any leadership role is to allow mechanisms to find out when that's happening and do the kind of coaching you need and role playing and navigating those where customer service and listening to the customer's genuine concern becomes important, and not just simply getting through the phone call or repeating whatever policy or procedure we've had. So the two takeaways if you're the CEO and you want to address that, the two real ways to do it is one, use a third party that sends an email to every encounter you've had and say, how are we doing? What did you like about our service? What didn’t you like? And the second, if your industry allows it, if your industry is teed up for that kind of thing, is to record the phone calls and have the supervisors listen to them and constructively bring in people and say, you know, that phone call? I think it was okay. But here I have some ideas where it might have gone better. And that's should be part of phone training, where you go over how you can improve, how you can sometimes diffuse things that, you know, might otherwise escalate by simply conveying to the person that you are aligned with them and you care about them, whether your product or service is something they're going to buy or not buy, you're there to help them. And I think conveying that will build a culture that, that, that, that the customer is not a widget is important and is valuable to your company. Okay. I hope that helps. just remember, your customer is not a widget. You're your client is not a widget, and you need to convey that even if that is the case, you need to come up with processes and and ways to communicate where you convey that to them. You may know it as the leader, but we have to convey that to the client. And that's how you get a client for life. Okay, I hope that helps. If you like this content, please comment, like and subscribe and we will see you on the next video. Thank you so much. Bye bye.