A Case for Loyalty
In a competitive environment, where there are daily challenges to compete for customers, customer satisfaction is oftentimes seen as a key performance indicator. As a result, companies and marketing organizations frequently conduct Customer Satisfaction Surveys to gain data on relationships to determine their customers’ purchase decisions. Unfortunately, the results gathered from these surveys are, in reality, NOT a clear indicator of customer relationships or customer intentions.
There are a few issues with Customer Satisfaction Surveys:
- Satisfaction is a fairly non-distinct term. What are you measuring: product; service; representation; response rate; etc.? The surveys generally lack clarity and relevance.
- Response rates for these types of surveys don’t normally exceed 2% - 5%, resulting in limited data points from which to draw wide-spread conclusions.
- Typically the surveyed customer selects "Satisfied" or "Very Satisfied" as a response.
According to Bain & Company, "60% - 80% of customer defectors score themselves as "Satisfied" or Very Satisfied" on satisfaction surveys preceding their defection."
On the other hand, understanding how loyal your customers are means that you are measuring their total “customer experience” with your company. You are gaining insight into both the economic and emotional value of the relationship; validating your superior value and their strong attachment. So, loyalty is a true measurement of the quality of the relationship.
Quality relationships and loyal customers are created by:
- You helping them solve their problems, quickly and easily.
- You removing obstacles from the relationship.
- You demonstrating consistent effort.
- Do your customers have to contact your company repeated to get a response and resolution?
- Do you create a situation where your customers have to repeat information?
- Do your customers have to navigate through multiple channels to get required attention?
- You creating a “frictionless customer experience."
The best measurement of the customer experience is to conduct a Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey.
The survey measures (0 - 10), how likely your customer will recommend you to a friend or colleague? Those customers that rate you high on the scale, the 9’s and 10’s are your most loyal and are those who will steer you in the direction of expanded and new business opportunities.
Thus, the Case for Loyalty!
The longer your loyal customers stay with you ... your opportunities grow:
- Cross-sell additional services
- Benefit from referrals
- Build a strong reference
- Strong client retention results in a higher value company
Loyal customers enhance your ability to create more cooperative or collaborative relationships. Having those relationships enable you to work through and adapt to the changing needs of your customers, personnel changes; technology and digital advances, etc.
I highly recommend that you assess the type of customer relationships you have. Are your customers simply satisfied with your company? Or, are they going out of their way to provide you with referrals and recommending you to other potential customers? I would want to know!
Butler Street’s Loyalty and Voice of the Customer surveys have proven to be critical components to delivering strong customer experiences that increase loyalty, enhance brand and enable profitable growth. Statistics also reveal that the best participation ratios are achieved by third-party administered programs.
Butler Street, a leading management consulting, training and research firm focused on client and talent development, has formed an alliance with Printing Impressions, America’s most influential and widely read resource for the printing industry, to provide the de facto industry standard for measuring customer loyalty through its Best of Print & Digital Customer Survey.
If you are interested in understanding how Net Promoter Score and the Best of Print and Digital can help you grow your business, go to www.bestofprintanddigital.com
To take part in the 2017 Best of Print and Digital go to www.bestofprintanddigital.com.
Click here to watch the Printing Impressions interview with Mike Jacoutot, founder of Butler Street, and Mark Subers, president of Printing, Packaging and Publishing at NAPCO Media, as they discuss the new partnership program.
- Categories:
- Business Management - Marketing/Sales
Frank Costantino is a Managing Partner at Butler Street, a leading management consulting, training and research firm that focuses on client and talent development. Prior to joining Butler Street, Costantino accumulated over three decades of successful sales and executive leadership experience. His passion for sales discipline and process has driven practical solutions for sales organization development, revenue and operating profit growth.
Costantino has been recognized with numerous sales and sales leadership awards. He has also received top honors from his peers and direct reporting teams in VOA rankings, and has also served on the Advisory Board of Target Account Selling. He holds a B. S. in Business Management from NYIT.
