Success Depends On Helping Customers Shape Their Conditions

Customer integration includes helping customers choose which products & services best fit their needs. Your degree of integration can determine how much customers need & want your offers.

In The Discipline of Market Leaders, Michael Treacy & Fred Wiersema suggest customer intimacy as a practice for using thorough customer knowledge.

If you know customers’ conditions & products thoroughly, you can maximize benefits of your offers compared to competitors.

In this post, I’m using conditions to mean things that might respond to people’s efforts.

Since retail success depends on fulfilling expectations, help people produce & preserve comfortable conditions. Ask customers to describe desired conditions & how they expect to produce & preserve desired conditions.

Ask how customers define comfort, then use their criteria & product specifications to plan actions. Planned actions adapt conditions to produce & maintain results. Actions can include advantageously placing products &/or combining products with tasks for specific benefits.

Help customers review what increases & decreases quality, so you can augment positive aspects & eliminate whatever reduces satisfaction. Reviews can begin like stories in current conditions before benefits are created & conclude with achieved goals of improved conditions. Determine which products & actions will fill gaps between current conditions & achieved goals.

Visually-oriented people can use story boards to track the beginning, interim results & goal achievement. Replace pictures or descriptions that don’t fit a goal or available products until all seems comfortable & realistic.

I’ve heard about a landscape & architecture firm making models, so clients knew what to expect. You can use computers & graphics to produce similar effects that can be adjusted until your & clients’ expectations match.

That could be done with clothes also. Use pictures of people dressed like those expected at meetings or events. Determine if customers’ potential clothing choices blend in or stand out as expected.

To determine if expectations are realistic & how to fulfill them, these stories could compare project steps with the progress customers expect. After describing total expected progress, determine if each step fulfills its role.

How do customers currently maintain progress & improve conditions? What should their next steps be? What do they need for their next steps?

Since copycat products can reduce benefits & quality, help people choose optimal product versions. Checklists can help customers know when steps, tasks & projects are completed, so they get full quality.

Offer Example: ‘You get full quality at (store) with information about creating & maintaining lasting results. You need to use high quality products in optimal ways, so (store) has those products & that information.’

For successful preventative maintenance & repairs, it’s important to determine problem causes & effects. Help people identify negative effects & determine if maintenance is still practical or repairs are necessary.

Offer Example: ‘Instead of buying cheap products & getting unreliable results, your best option is advice from (store) to identify problems you need to prevent & repair. After finding what you need, let’s choose products & plan your tasks for long-term results that protect what’s important to you.’

If maintenance or repairs are necessary for consistent results, consult with customers about what they need & should expect from maintenance & repairs.

Examples: Would maintenance preserve original results or should customers expect some shortfall? Would repairs restore original results? What level of results should customers expect from tools & materials?

Help customers compare benefits of maintenance or repairs with upgrades.

Example: ‘Since your enjoyment depends on your equipment, let's review your options of maintenance, repairs or upgrading to new technology. Upgrade your current activities or experience new options. Now you can increase your enjoyment of (activities) because (products) have (features) that produce more vivid __. (Store) has everything you need for setup & enjoyment. New product maintenance is easier because __, so you can spend more time doing __. Occasional maintenance makes your enjoyment last for years.’

Set Expectations for Satisfaction

When people know what to expect from products, they can set budgets for producing & maintaining desired results.

Without advice, people might buy what seems adequate instead of comparing specifications with desired results. Help customers avoid failed results by comparing what they need & what’s possible from available products. If necessary, advise them about adjusting expectations &/or choosing other products.

Service Offer: ‘(Store) is designed to help you with specific home comfort results. Ask questions & express concerns, so we can choose the best options based on your needs & desires. Your time & money spent here are your investments in maintaining your comfortable home.’

High Quality & Less Stress

Make your messages & offers fit people’s needs for confidence & comfort.

When you compare your higher quality offers to competitors, explain why high quality affects results.

Example: ‘Cheap product warranties are short because products & results don’t last long. (Manufacturer) has a __ warranty; that gives you certainty because you can depend on (products) when you need (specific result). Good maintenance & repairs are important for protecting property & reducing your stress. Cheap products can be hard to maintain & repair because manufacturers want you to buy replacements. If you don’t know when products or results might fail, that uncertainty makes life harder. (Store) offers what you need to ensure your home is reliable. (Store) serves people instead of just selling products, so let’s be sure you get the right products & results.’

Optimize Opportunities & Gain Security

Discounters focus on SAVE, but people prioritize SAFE. If quality isn’t quite enough for fully secure results, people can lose what they needed to protect, plus what they’ve spent on cheap products. Many retailers push people to shop for products instead of results. Since people buy for results, differentiate your store by focusing your advertising & customer service on specific results for specific reasons (Examples: increase pleasure, decrease discomfort, solve &/or prevent problems).

Offer Example: ‘Let’s review your current needs & future results you can expect, because after solving problems, you should prevent reoccurrences. When discount store products don’t fully solve problems, prevention is harder. The priority at (store) is recommending high quality products to fulfill your priorities.’

In your store, you can guide product choices based on customers’ answers.

Question Examples: Do you want (result) to decrease discomfort? What causes your discomfort? Are there ever different causes?

Is it the same kind & level of discomfort each time? What seems to change?

If we can’t eliminate each cause, which cause should we prioritize? (Product) costs $__ & might decrease discomfort XX%, should we disregard it & consider a higher priced, better quality option?

Ask customers about obstacles to identifying, solving & preventing problems, so you can remove limits.

Help customers prevent big losses by identifying actual preliminary & potential damage. When damage is preliminary, help customers determine what to repair or replace by identifying causes.

Problems can still happen if people quickly do repairs without knowing causes. If damage is bad, try to find replacements that are less vulnerable recurrent causes.

Offer Example: ‘Let’s identify causes because maintenance should prevent negative effects. When we know which benefits you want & identify problems you need to prevent, we’ll find products & make plans for those results.’

Determine whether previous technology or upgrades are compatible with customers' current property & which versions provide needed benefits.

Explain how products & services help people overcome problems, avoid potential losses &/or optimize opportunities (potential gains).

How do products & services help people overcome limits? How do high quality products produce better benefits than cheap products?

After determining which results people need, explain how products maximize results. How will your service help people save time & effort, plus produce & maintain benefits better than competitors?

When people feel secure against losses, they can focus on opportunities.

Note: People usually will prioritize loss reduction or prevention, even if you offer the greatest opportunities. So, when people feel threatened by losses, you should offer help for their highest priorities.

Since people have ‘conditions’ (plural) they need to divide & prioritize resources among issues to maintain some results.

Some people might prioritize based on importance, ability to do tasks &/or affordability. If they lack money for products &/or knowledge about tasks, it’s hard to prioritize issues they can’t resolve.

To persuade people to prioritize your offers, help them prioritize & resolve issues.

Offer Example: ‘Your To-Do List probably includes seasonal tasks, so you need to find time plus money for supplies. Some products & tasks might be unfamiliar. (Store) has information about products & tasks for preventing & solving problems, so you can quickly learn & finish tasks. Let’s make your efforts effective & efficient by reviewing your highest concerns about repairs & preventing damage. Let’s reduce your stress as we make your home as comfortable as possible.’

Thank you for using my blog. Please let me know if I should clarify anything. Copyright 2020 Dennis S. Vogel All rights reserved. When you compete against big businesses with big budgets you need powerful marketing strategies & tactics. You'll find them here- https://thriving-small-businesses.blogspot.com/