The Importance of Customer Satisfaction in Business
There are multiple factors which contributes to the success (or failure) of a business. Customer Satisfaction is one of the key factors amongst them. It is very important for an organization to keep track of its customer satisfaction levels and see which factors are successful for their business and which aspects need improvements. It is critical to view your business from the customer’s perspective and address the findings. Simply put, if you don’t care about your customer, the customer in turn doesn’t care about your products or services. Analyzing Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) provides critical early warning signs about your customers – whether they are happy, unhappy or potentially at risk of abandoning your products or services altogether.
It is prudent to keep an eye on the quality of services you are providing to your customers. Delivering high quality services can win your customer’s heart and make you stand out from your competition. Hence, let’s discuss the impact of customer satisfaction on business performance.
Factors Affecting Customer Satisfaction:
There are many factors which affect the overall customer experience. Some of them are:
- Type & quality of the responses provided by the supplier to the customer.
- Performance, cost and quality of the product/services provided to customer.
- The Customer Life-cycle Management Process of the supplier.
- Ability of the supplier to meet the committed deadlines.
- Friendliness and etiquette’s of the supplier towards their customers.
Critical Pointers To Achieve Customer Satisfaction
- Be Genuine with your Customers: Build an environment of trust with your customers by making realistic commitments and then delivering them. A customer who perceives you as a genuine supplier is more likely to recommend your offerings in their professional network. Research has shown that word-of-mouth recommendations always play an important role in procurement decisions of all sizes.
- Build Stronger Relationship: If a customer is satisfied with your products & services they will definitely continue to buy from you as price is no longer the deciding factor for a satisfied customers. It is actually easier to retain an existing customer than acquiring a new one. So, try to make a long-term relationship with your esteemed customers by fulfilling all the commitments you have made with them in a timely manner.
- Deliver A Superior Customer Experience: Endeavor to deliver a superior customer experience to your customers at every touch-point – from an easily navigable website, an informed and courteous tele-caller, an informative yet non-spammy e-mailer to a sales person who is willing to listen and understand the requirement of the customer first, rather than forcing a solution down his throat. A better customer experience ensures that your brand always remains ahead of your competitors.
- Regular Meetings: Even of you are delivering the best of quality in the promised time-frames, it is important to meet/call your customers at a regular frequency. Even small steps like wishing them on their Birthdays/New Year/Festivals, etc. or talking to them on subjects of their interest other than Business also helps greatly in improving Customer Satisfaction.
Action Plan for Achieving Customer Satisfaction
- Listen and Analyse Customer Voice: Engage with your customers in a structured manner regularly, because they can help you in identifying many of your shortcomings quickly. Prepare a list of questions, ask for feedback from your customer and then extract the meaningful insights from the result.
- Create A Customer-Centric Enterprise: To take your services to the next level, create a customer-centric enterprise that can not only handle customer queries in a better way but can also deliver a more satisfying customer experience at every touch-point.
There are various action plans that can be implemented by a business to have a better and ever-lasting customer experience. But, for quick results one can follow the steps as discussed above.
Conclusion:
The Importance of Customer Satisfaction in Business can never be over-emphasized. It has the potential of transforming mediocre businesses into great enterprises and conversely, making great enterprises bite the dust. Start your Customer Satisfaction journey today, take a quick survey from all your customers and plan better strategies for a better tomorrow.
