EGO and Customer Satisfaction: Part 3
Align expectations to create a clear path to customer satisfaction.
Jim Stein
Published Date: July 17, 2024
Customer Interaction: Understanding and Managing Expectations
Establish up front what your customer expects from you by asking, “What results do you expect to see from our work?” When you understand the customer’s expectations, you can address any misconceptions before the work begins. After you’ve done this, confirm with a statement about what you’ll do and then ask the follow-up question, “Would that be helpful to you?” or some variation. Gaining her agreement to this question binds you both in a psychological contract. It establishes the standard for satisfactory performance in the customer’s mind.
This conversation may sound like you’re giving up control to the customer, but the reality is you’ve prompted them to commit to one mutually acceptable marker for satisfaction. You’ve preempted the “moving target.” Now you will focus on this standard.
Related Blogs
Why is Helpful Expertise so Important?
Jim Stein
Giving Helpful Expertise means meeting customers where they are by customizing your responses based on their job specifics, personal communication style and pacing. Too often companies fail to help customers because of mismatched communication styles they don’t provide answers to key unasked questions – your potential customers don’t know what they need […]
Helpful Expertise #4: Knowledge + #5: Insights
Jim Stein
Expertise is what members of your team know about the various types of work they produce and the industry they belong to. They’ve gained this knowledge through direct experience and study. You’ve trained them on Best Practices, which produce better outcomes, and they use their expertise to communicate with customers and decide how to do the work.
Latest Blogs
Force Success
Jim Stein
Ask most company managers and they’ll tell you the key to satisfying customers is to “do what the customer wants.” Although this is a reasonable answer, I believe in adding to this by embracing the philosophy of “do what the customer needs.” Although it takes extra time to educate a customer and merge their wants with newly learned needs, it leads to a more satisfied customer and it’s the right thing to do.
EGO and Customer Satisfaction: Part 3
Jim Stein
Establish up front what your customer expects from you by asking, “What results do you expect to see from our work?” When you understand the customer’s expectations, you can address any misconceptions before the work begins.