Put Customer First And Bottom Line

If the customer is lost in the search for the bottom line in your business? With such a focus on quarterly profits and losses in those days, it is easy to sacrifice in favor of the customer needs a bit of "breathing until the next crisis. The problem with this strategy, your customers will probably not be there to ignore the next year or maybe even the next quarter. The key is to provide strategies that both your customers and your shareholders happy and not so wild to develop a concept of how it sounds.

A few years ago I was the strategy of creating value for a client processing credit cards and society as a result of an intensive analysis of customers, I found a fairly large segment of customers such two, three or even five times their present prices, would be estimated because the company's products and services higher. I recommended it receives 1-2 times more responsible for the added value resulting in $ 20MM offset the additional annual revenue.

But the CEO focuses on a different search in my search: choose the provider of business was a success and a single decision. He chose companies that perform competitive analysis, due diligence, and select a supplier and would almost never check prices, fees or other income statement. The CEO has decided to increase all taxes and pay a "contribution" of $ 70 annually.

There are three things to say. The first is that it is wrong and immoral, pure and simple. Second, all the poor, rather than the depreciation in the game. Everyone is forced to endure is not an additional burden, because only those who really appreciate the service. Third, the worst of all, this decision highlights the short-term revenue at the expense of long-term customers.

As we all learned as children grow, is the basis of a lie, which only works until you get caught. If your strategy is to be dependent not get caught, Murphy's Law inevitably prevail. If your customers do not realize is that your competitors site with great joy! Consequences have a tendency to take us at least when we can afford.

There is a huge amount of research and anecdotal evidence that huge loyal customers between 5% -33% to generate more revenue than non-loyal customers. Trust is the basis for that loyalty. If it destroys trust, customers feel they have been abused and exploited. Ultimately, you are sacrificing loyalty, sales and customers - it's so easy.