How It Grows Your Business
The number one thing that determines how much of a success or failure your business will be is customer satisfaction. You can create the greatest product in the world, but if your customers are not satisfied, you will not grow your business. If sales are the engine that drives a business to success, then customer satisfaction is the fuel that keeps it running.
What makes the difference in most situations is whether or not you met expectations. This is true of any relationship, be it your spouse, parents, children, employees or customers. Failing to meet expectations can take a potentially great relationship and drag it down to something that drives the other person away.
For customers, there are four levels of satisfaction and they are all determined by how you meet their expectations. The more you go above and beyond those expectations, the stronger that customer relationship and the further you will go on the path to success.
1. Meet Expectations
With expectations, you want to keep one thing in mind: Under-promise, over-deliver. Don’t set yourself up for failure.
At the minimum, your customers want you to meet their expectations. Deliver on what you say you are going to deliver. This keeps them satisfied and they have no reason to complain, for now. Meeting their minimum standards, however, does not create loyalty. Your customer can easily be persuaded to choose a competitor who goes beyond meeting their expectations.
2. Exceed Expectations
Most customers do not expect you to deliver the moon, but doing a little something extra to go above their expectations will always make a great impression. This can be something as small as helping them out to the car with their purchases or following up with a phone call to make sure they were satisfied with their experience.
Small ways of surprising your customers can go a long way to developing brand loyalty.
3. Go Above and Beyond
Think of a time when you were a customer and the employee or business owner actually brought a huge smile to your face. What did they do? How did they go above and beyond in that experience and make it memorable for you?
Customers who not only have their basic expectations met but are also treated to a memorable experience have formed an emotional connection to your brand. This is a moment they will tell their friends, family and neighbors about.
4. Absolutely Amaze
This is the top level of customer satisfaction and it can really propel your business to success.
Not only are your customers satisfied that you’ve met their expectations but they’ve seen you go way beyond the norm and create an exceptional experience with your company, something they will be talking about to the people around them. This can be a result of any number of actions through stellar customer service.
When you get to this level, you have forged a bond with your customer that takes them to the level of a brand advocate, someone who is out there spreading your name to the people who need your products or services too.
If you want to see your business grow substantially, then you need to focus a lot of attention on the level of satisfaction your customers experience in each interaction with your company.