When all is said and done, business is about solving other people’s problems. We all get up every day and go to work to help other people. Money is simply the reward for doing so. To solve others’ problems effectively, we need to understand their pain. The more you can relate to other people’s problems, the more they will love you. The magic word in sales is empathy, the ability to relate to other people’s problems with compassion.
As a businessperson, you probably started a business or got into business because you have passion and understanding about a certain subject area. But people don’t buy to satisfy your interests and desires. They buy because there is a shortcoming in their lives that your product or service can fill.
Play the part of the customer. Discover what your customers will likely experience when they use your product or service. You must be totally convinced that the customer experience is something that will make them want to come back and refer you to their friends. Your marketing will be ineffective unless you have satisfied customers that turn into clients that want to go out and sell for you and refer you to others. Remember what you learned in move 2. You need to have the goods, and the goods need to provide your customers with an experience that converts them into clients, and your extended sales force.
If your product or service isn’t easy or fun to use, refine it. If there is a product development issue, improve on it. Maybe you simply need to update your product or service.
Continually push your product development team or vendors to the maximum to stay in line with market requirements and expectations.
Find out exactly what your customers experience when they use your product or service and what alternatives they have. Spend one day a week playing the customer. Use your own product or service, and suggest improvements to the development team or to whomever you source it from. Order competitive products or visit competitors’ stores. How do they treat you as a customer? Is their product or service easier to use than yours? What do they do differently from you? Know what your competition is up to, and always know what your customer is experiencing.
When you focus on the customer, not the competition, you focus on the right thing. Know what your competitors are doing, but do not divert the attention from your customers. Many companies try to outperform their competition, but how do these companies know the competition is doing the right thing? The truth always comes from your customers (the market), not the competition. As a black belt marketer, you must know this.
The market makes the final call on the success of a product or service, so make it your goal to understand your customers.