4 Fundamentals of Creating Successful Customer Relationships

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If businesses exist, as the father of Business Management Peter Drucker proposed, “to create and keep a customer,” then success is defined by the relationships you establish with your customers. Giving them the best experience possible goes a long way toward securing future business. Here are four fundamentals of creating successful relationships with customers and prospects:

Give Undivided Attention
Attentive time is among the most limited of all resources. As we split time and attention in more ways than ever before, the amount available per person gets smaller and smaller. Reduce the likelihood that the other person feels you’re not really ‘present’ by putting away your devices and giving them your undivided attention. Not only does this demonstrate your professionalism, it shows you value their time as much as they value yours. Don’t worry; those messages, texts, or tweets will all be there later.

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About the Author

Mike MuhneyCRM pioneer Mike Muhney, the co-creator of ACT! software, is CEO of mobile relationship management purveyor vipOrbit – the first relationship-centric contact manager solution enabling mobile business professionals to manage their contacts, calendar and client/customer interactions across Mac, iPhone and iPad platforms. He may be reached at www.VIPOrbit.com.

6 Silent Productivity and Profitability Pitfalls, part 3 of 7

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Silent Killer #2: Not Listening

To truly listen does not mean merely hearing or paying attention. Listening is a specific type of active interpretation that shapes our realities.

This largely unknown and certainly unrecognized skill is critical in the new business world. By blindly creating and/or tolerating working conditions in which people do not and often cannot effectively listen to one another, we kill productivity and profitability. This lack of listening can be the result of degenerative moods (e.g., institutionalized mistrust, resignation, or resentment), technology addiction (which can make it difficult for some people to actually talk to others), or a simple incompetence for speaking and listening. Regardless of the reason, if people are not listening to each other, accomplishing anything significant becomes extremely expensive, and making effective changes becomes all but impossible.

According to the International Listening Association, more than 35 studies indicate that listening is a top skill needed for success in business. Yet, less than 2 percent of all professionals have had formal education or learning to understand and improve listening skills and techniques.

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About the Author

Chris Majer, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Human Potential ProjectChris Majer, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Human Potential Project, is the author of The Power to Transform: Passion, Power, and Purpose in Daily Life (Rodale), which teaches the strategies corporate, military, and sports leaders have used to positively transform themselves and their organizations in a way readers can adept to their own lives and professions. He may be reached at www.humanpotentialproject.com.

The New World of Beta Curation

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Today’s American corporate world is a tale of two cultures. One, more traditional and common, is centralized and hierarchical. I call it Alpha. The other, smaller and rarer, is decentralized, horizontal, and inclusive. I call this one Beta. To flourish in today’s business environment, organizations and individuals need to transition from the outdated Alpha system to the fast-growing Beta paradigm. The increased communication and collaboration required of Beta organizations demand a new style of leadership and career planning.

Beta leaders need to be curators, not commanders. Rather than striving to be content experts on every aspect of their operation, they need to be able to collect, sort, analyze data, and edit all communication and collaborative streams of information that could potentially influence their business. Organizations need to have dozens, maybe hundreds, of individual experts, fully capable of idea generation and innovative thought. In turn, these experts must be encouraged to drill down deep in their own specializations, develop plans and strategies, and share them with the rest of the organization. Beta leaders then need to sort through the ideas, figure out how they fit together, and then recombine them so the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

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About the Author

Dana Ardi, Ph.D. is the founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors and the author of The Fall of the Alphas: The New Beta Way to Connect, Collaborate, Influence – and Lead. She has served as a Partner/Managing Director at CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners and was a Partner at Flatiron Partners. Earlier in her career, Dr. Ardi was an operating executive at R. R. Donnelly & Sons and at McGraw-Hill. She also has a background managing and leading executive search firms. To read Dr. Ardi’s complete biography, click here.

The Advisor’s Corner – How can I build relationships with key stakeholders?

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Stakeholder relationshipsQuestion:

How can I build relationships with key stakeholders?

StrategyDriven Response: (by Roxi Hewertson, StrategyDriven Principal Contributor)

Competition for our time has never, in the history of human kind, been so intense. Yet, if we fail to make time to connect in authentic and meaningful ways with other people, we cannot lead well and our business results will suffer dramatically.

By connecting well, we can discover where we have opportunities for synergy with others. Synergy can be defined as two or more people (or things) functioning together to produce a result NOT independently obtainable. Synergies are important both within and outside our primary workplace. There’s even a new word to describe this when we connect well with our competitors – ‘coopitition’ or ‘coopertition,’ meaning two or more competitors working together to achieve a common goal.

Here are three things you can do to connect and look for opportunities for synergy:

1. Ask don’t tell. Too often people are ‘telling’ others what they think, want, know and feel. Stephen Covey reminds us to “Seek first to understand, then seek to be understood.” This wisdom comes from the native peoples throughout the world and is found in every scripture known to human kind. Yet, we are often too busy or too focused on our own ‘stuff’ to remember this.

2. Find common ground. When two or more people choose to take the time to look more deeply, they can and will find common ground where they can build a powerful foundation for trust and collaboration. Try this:

  • Seek out things you have in common with others – values, family, books, artwork, background, education, passions, experiences… you’ll find them.
  • When you’ve made a connection, build upon it. Allow yourself to share some vulnerability. This gives others more safety to do the same. The more authentic you are, the more authentic others can risk being with you.
  • Sometimes the best place to grow connection and common ground is with people with whom you disagree. When people have a common goal, a common enemy, or a common dream they can overcome differences in other areas. So next time someone disagrees with you consider saying: “Help me understand why you feel/think the way you do. I would like to learn more about your point of view.”

3. Get out of your chair. This is not a brilliant new idea, but more than ever we get stuck on our computers, notebooks, and phones. When you walk around, notice what people have placed in their workspace that matters to them, pictures, sayings, colors, etc. You will hear conversations you’d never hear otherwise, and you’ll be present. If you go with the intention to observe, connect, and catch people doing something right, and if you are listening, people will begin to look forward to the opportunity to see and interact with you. No time? Think again.

  • Randomly book 30 minutes once or twice a week to wander- with no agenda, no plan, and no goal. Come back to your workspace and write down what you observed and learned. Do not to jump to hasty conclusions – just note your observations and check them out the next week you wander around.
  • Randomly schedule 15-30 minute no agenda ‘chats’ with your employees, peers, others. Meet in their space, for lunch, for a walk around the work site.
  • Call up a few external people every month, to reconnect and keep your network fresh and alive.

Everything we do and how well we do it, in any enterprise, is impacted daily by the quality of our relationships. Building and strengthening our relationship, and finding win/win synergies with all our stakeholders, must be an integral part of every leader’s strategy for success.

About the Author

Leadership authority Roxana (Roxi) Hewertson is a no-nonsense business veteran revered for her nuts-and-bolts, tell-it-like-it-is approach and practical, out-of-the-box insights that help both emerging and expert managers, executives and owners boost quantifiable job performance in various mission critical facets of business. Through AskRoxi.com, Roxi — “the Dear Abby of Leadership” — imparts invaluable free advice to managers and leaders at all levels, from the bullpen to the boardroom, to help them solve problems, become more effective and realize a higher measure of business and career success.

The StrategyDriven website was created to provide members of our community with insights to the actions that help create the shared vision, focus, and commitment needed to improve organizational alignment and accountability for the achievement of superior results. We look forward to answering your strategic planning and tactical business execution questions. Please email your questions to [email protected].

To bid or not to bid? That is the question.

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“They get bids for everything and always take the lowest bid.”
“They send out an RFP and I can never speak to the decision maker.”
“We’re becoming a commodity. All they do is take the lowest bid.”
“It’s the government. They have to take the lowest bid.”

Many companies have become smart buyers, but many have become too smart. They’ve refined the buying process so far that they have precluded the words ‘quality’ and ‘value’ from the buying process AND they have taken the words productivity, ease of use, and morale out of the delivery process.

The typical request for proposal (RFP) has a bunch of standards about what has to be offered by the vendor, but far too little (or nothing) about what happens after the company takes ownership. They have the ‘specs’ in the RFP, but not the details of use, value, productivity, or morale.

The major flaw with the RFP process is that the people conducting the bidding are not the people who use the product or service once the bidding is complete. Nor, for the most part, do they care.

The main goal of bidding is NOT get the best product. The main goal of bidding is get the cheapest price. And oftentimes that precludes the best product. It also lowers the profit of the company doing the bidding. Long-term, this is not good for the survival of a company.

REALITY: “The customer took the lowest bid” is as bogus as “the dog ate my homework.” The fact is you let the customer control the selling/buying process. Not good.
REALITY: If you follow the customer’s RFP requirements you will lose even if you win. If you win, it’s likely you did at a severe reduction of price and loss of profit. Not good.

That’s the bad news. Let me give you the good news, and the sales news…

There are several strategies you can employ to get around the bidding process, or legally and ethically change the bidding process. Here are some ideas you can begin to use immediately:

1. Ask for a clause to be put into the RFP that states all claims must be backed up with customer testimonial videos as proof. Any procurement department should be happy to add this clause into their bidding process. It will assure them that everything being claimed will come to pass. This will also help in establishing the reality of installation, ease-of-use, and long-term serviceability. PROVE IT TO WIN IT.
2. Request that the people who actually use the product or service you’re selling be more involved in the selection process. Especially as it relates to their actual experience and their projected needs. This is not as difficult as it sounds, especially if you can apply internal pressure to senior management where your product will be used. Keep in mind that procurement and purchasing don’t actually use what they purchase. They just buy. They’re relying on the person or people who made the INTERNAL request, and will often get their input before making a final decision.
3. Make an appointment with the CFO. He or she is most interested in making a profit, not just saving a dollar. Make your case against taking the lowest price and in favor of making a profit. RULE OF SALE: The higher you go to make your presentation, the easier the sale becomes.
4. Have an active social media presence that is easily findable, so your reputation is both visible and impressive. The customer will check you out BEFORE you get there, and may use it as part of the decision-making process.
4.5 GAIN BETTER INSIGHT TO THE PURCHASE OF YOUR PRODUCTS AND SERVICES. Talk to the person who MAKES the budget, not the person who spends it. Make service response time a mandatory part of the bid. Talk to those responsible for what happens AFTER purchase, not the people buying it. Make certain that third-party proof, in video, is a major part of your proposal.

CAUTION: The bidding process is often tightly controlled by those who execute it. The only people likely to influence change of modification are C-level executives. Get with them as part of your normal selling process.

NOTE WELL: Every company, even the government, has ‘preferred vendors.’ People who have achieved a ‘higher than equal’ status. Become one of them.

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

About the Author

Jeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].