No matter how many customers you have: The central theme of this quote is to treat your customer as an individual. I’m a huge fan of data, but there’s a big problem in treating people as data. The only way to do business is by treating customers as people. If we’re able to understand our customers and do our best to provide them a great quality of service – then the type of business is of a great pleasure.
No matter how many customers you have!
In the early days, a startup strives to create a product-market fit. This is where I think startups are great. They have their eyes and ears at the ground and constantly listen to customers. This is fantastic because the founder is obsessed with customer problems. This gives you an ability to move swiftly with customer requests.
However, as customer numbers increase, it becomes difficult to manage this type of relationship with feedback. But the most important thing to remember is to treat customers as people. Although they might represent data points when the startup grows (Read more – startups are about expansion and scaling the product market fit)
Your customers are your greatest source of information
Your customers constant offer great value. They keep telling us how best to serve them. Unfortunately some businesses are caught up in processes. This makes them blind to customer pains and problems. As Bill Gates says – Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning. If they’re complaining, it means that they haven’t yet lost their trust on you.
The complaints are an indicator that people still like your business and are willing to put up with some problems. They also indicate that their patience will run out if you don’t act on them. In other words, these complaints are giving you a chance to improve and serve your customer needs.
The Customer Individual
Yes, B2B – business to business conversations are important. It is also important to note that each of these conversations are with individuals with real thoughts and feelings. There is little point in faking a personal relationship if there is none.
If at some instances we are able to look beyond the sample transactional relations and business converstaions, there is so much more richness you can derive from a business conversation itself. The best conversations I have had have been of this sort.
Having said this, I must admit that I am not a very good salesperson. But I do like people and trying to know them better. This served quite well in the first business I was in. I just liked what I did, there was value added through the process and business almost seemed to take a secondary stance. I know there are quite a few oppositions to this school of thought. But I thought this line of thought about individuals coming from a company which is known for CRM tools is quite interesting indeed.
We would love to hear your thoughts on the quote:
“No matter how many customers you have, each is an individual. The day you start thinking of them as this amorphous ‘collection’ and stop thinking of them as people is the day you start going out of business”
-Dharmesh Shah, Co-Founder of HubSpot
People will forget and if what you told them is not to their advantage or you perceive that what you told them could interfere with the deal, you may, conveniently, not tell them again. Big mistake
Well, maybe some would, I do agree there are a fair share out there who try to turn your words against you. But there are also a fairer share out there who try to help out and reach out to others just because they are good people. Of the lot, I would certainly hedge my bets on the latter :)