Managing Your Customers
N Nagaraj
Caveat emptor. Let the buyer beware. That was the situation in India at the turn of this decade. Now, the customer is King. How have enterprises oriented themselves to their changed circumstances? What more needs to be done? This issue of Praxis looks at the theme 'Managing your customers' in the context of finding answers to these questions.
A business needs to manage its customers well to manage its future. Customers can be managed in the sense that they can be made to come back to the business again and again for their requirements. The primary vehicle for this is customer focus. All companies need customer focus if they have to survive the present and grow in the future. The problem with customer focus in India is that most companies don't realise that it is neither a one time exercise nor does it happen automatically once the planning is completed and the infrastructure put in place. It is a continuous process and the relevant systems have to be flexible and interactive in the extreme. Another major strategy to retain customers is developing a relationship with customers.
Building a relationship with the customer is not the exclusive preserve of enterprises in the service industry. True, relationships are easy to create in the service industry such as hotels, airlines, credit cards and banking. The reason is simple: Meeting the customers is the business; the frontline people interact with the customers on a continuous basis. Relationships are rather basic for the service industry: if a customer is dissatisfied with the service, (s)he will shift, and that, immediately. One advantage, however, that the service industry has is that customer satisfaction/ unhappiness is immediately apparent to the frontline people and there is enough time to convince the customer to continue to deal with the company.
However, what is clear now is that customer relationships are necessary for all businesses and especially in the durable and semi-durable categories. Reason? When the consumer eventually wants a replacement, (s)he should return to the brand; not shift. And one more reason: most durable majors are in more than one product category - a relationship with the customer may help the company attract customers in one category to its other products. And, of course, the power of word-of-mouth: Loyal customers are more likely to bring in more and loyal customers than merely satisfied customers.
What about consumables and categories where the company sells a mass product and has so many customers that it can't really keep in touch with them? This is where customer focus assumes tremendous significance. Make the product right and deliver it right: Customers will keep coming back to the brand.
The customer is King; customer focus is the rule. What next? How, for instance, will companies know what customers need ? The obvious answer: Keep in touch. The problem in India is that consumers don't cooperate and give a feedback. This apart, companies also have problems trying to find out what the consumer exactly, wants. As market researchers would say: 'stated behaviour is totally different from actual behaviour.'
Building relationships is a challenging task. Businesses have to contend with strong resistance to any approach that may be viewed as intrusive. Some customers are annoyed when companies send regular mailers to keep in touch. Some customers do not even bother to send in completed warranty cards; most do not inform their suppliers about changes in address or telephone numbers; and worst of all, some potential customers refuse to leave a contact with the marketer. This certainly makes a potential customer/existing customer database meaningless. This takes us on to the next hot topic: networking infrastructure and connectivity.
Perhaps the best use of connectivity is made by some banks, credit card companies, travel agents, and, though it seems incongruous, the railways. The rapid development in information technology has made it possible for companies to get in touch and take care of customers in a moment. For instance, the article, Lessons from Service Leaders, featured in this issue was obtained using the new connectivity. The computer major, Unisys, had to be asked permission to use the artide that had been listed on its website on the internet. Here is the sequence of events:
1210 hrs IST: email Unisys for permission. Unisys' time was about -9:30 IST (Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). It was around 0240 EDT.
1715 hrs IST: response from Unisys' webmaster thanking for the contact and saying that the request had been forwarded to the person best equipped to deal with it. Message sent at 0909 hrs EDT.
1725 hrs IST: response from their communications manager that the permission was granted. Message sent at 0919 hrs EDT.
First thing in the morning and within ten minutes of coming in to work, a major request handled positively and competently with a minimum of fuss, perhaps even with a smile. And all this, not for a customer and not for someone who will probably even become one. That's service.