What’s your company’s top priority? One thing’s for sure: product and processes are no longer the most important dynamics. Today, it’s not about what’s the most important thing - but who: your customers. And digital has a big role to play.
It’s time to become a customer-centric businesses, for numerous reasons. For starters, Customer-centric companies have the competitive advantage over their competitors. When your company revolves around your customers, you increase customer satisfaction and loyalty. Customer-centric companies are also 60% more profitable than businesses that aren’t.
Unsurprisingly, this surge of customer centricity correlates with the hyper-connected digital age we live in. As a result, even small companies have to examine their digital efforts, combine them with a customer-centric company culture and manage the customer experience from start to finish if they want to stay on top of their game.
Improving the digital customer experience
Nowadays, customers are engaging with companies in more ways than ever before and expect a single, seamless experience across different platforms. For example, a customer might ask you a question using Facebook Messenger. Should the same customer call you, they will expect you know all about the Messenger conversation. Even more, the customer expects a quick and satisfying reply to every point of contact.
Improving the digital customer experience is necessary to meet their expectations. The digital customer experience is the sum of all digital interactions between a customer and a company and influences how they perceive your business.
The digital customer experience starts with... people
There’s little use in employing technology if not supported by the people who have to adopt it. That is universally true for your customers, but for your employees as well.
When thinking about digital customer experience, culture outweighs technology. Companies with the right technology still need to embrace a customer-centric view. In other words, shifting your employees’ mindset so they start thinking like your customers is just as important as employing the right tools and channels.
Manage the customer experience from start to finish
Focus on improving the digital experience throughout the whole customer lifecycle. Investing the majority of your resources in sales and marketing, while neglecting customer service, retention loyalty, and engagement, is a losing bet. You should create superior experiences during every encounter a customer has with your company, if you want to make them truly happy.
As a small company, you might already have the edge over corporate giants: small businesses are known for providing a more personal customer experience. Live up to those expectations and convince your clients every day why they should stay with you.
Looking for software that could support your SME towards becoming a more customer-centric organisation? Discover how Teamleader can help.
Five digital essentials of a customer-centric business
To deliver this superior customer experience, focus on the following five things which characterise every customer-centric business.
- Fast help: consumers are very impatient online. Make sure your website loads quickly, is easy to navigate and offers all the right information, so your consumers don’t give up and leave. The same applies to answering questions or complaints: try to respond as fast as possible. Having a system in place that helps you follow up on communication with customers, could really help improve your response time.
- Brand consistency: a customer’s impression of a brand is like a mosaic, made up of different, individual touch points. The overall perception has a big influence on customer loyalty, convincing customer to stay if you provide a consistent digital experience.
- Reliability in communication: customers don’t want to repeat themselves over and over again when they’re interacting with you through different channels. Use software to support you, tracking all interactions and tying them together across all channels.
- Measuring to improve: measure how your customers feel about your business to find opportunities for improvement. Don’t assume your customers will proactively inform you if they had a rather negative experience. Customers rarely find the time for it, and by the time they express their dissatisfaction, it’s already too late.
Measuring customer satisfaction is easy: learn which strategies you could use by reading our blog.
- Recognising valuable customers: truly customer-centric organisations identify their most valuable customers and ensure they are (and stay) satisfied, by personalising their messaging, following up on them flawlessly and offering proactive support.
Want to become a more customer-centric business? Read our ebook, “Customer centricity in the Digital Age”.
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