What Would The Customer Want?

Several years after starting Billtrust we felt the need to have a guiding principle for engaging with customers.  When you handle millions of bills per month for hundreds of customers, there is a fair amount of questions, concerns, and sometimes complaints from customers. The famous line of "The Customer is Always Right" never felt right to me.  In fact, it is seriously debunked here.

After much deliberation (or maybe it came to me in a few seconds but "After much deliberation" sounds far better), we came up with a question as our guiding principal.  Every time we need to make a decision, we would ask ourselves "What would the customer want?" 

Here's a real example that occurred a few months ago when we strayed from our principal.

A customer sent in a billing file in to be processed that failed processing because it was missing a fax number.  A customer service rep immediately called the customer and let them know there was a problem and ask them to correct the file and resubmit it.  That’s good customer service. 

But is that "what the customer wants"?  My guess is no.  For something as basic as a missing fax number, maybe the customer just wants that item mailed out instead, or emailed back to them.  In fact, you probably don’t know until you ask.  That would be great customer service.

Some non-believers will argue, well wouldn't the customer want us to send out all of their bills for free?  Well maybe short term they would.  But long term if we did that we wouldn't be in business so there obviously needs to be a balance.

We need to earn a customer's business every day because we live in a highly competitive market. This guiding principal has helped us immensely.  What do you think?

Comments

[Robert]

There are many ways to figure out what the customer wants ranging from formal surveys to simply picking up the phone and asking. There is always one common thread to truly understanding the needs of customers. We must all listen carefully and ask a lot of questions. This is something that we preach throughout our company.

[wayne]

I like the "what would the customer want" question.

I've come to believe that employees will work to whatever level they are reasonably expected to. If you treat your employees like they need constant supervision and believe that without it they will be lazy and give poor customer service, they most likely will prove you correct. If you respect them and believe that they are competent to do their jobs, if you empower them to do what is in the best interest of your company and your customers, they will most likely reward you by behaving that way.

I think your guiding principal also suggests some thinking out of the box. Too often I meet people who are stuck in their set way of thinking; what is most efficient for them. Sometimes I need to point out to them that what is easiest for us may not have any value to our clients, or at least not optimal value. Clients can be the same way. They are use to getting information or service a certain way and do not understand that other forms might be more useful. Often the client doesn't even know what they want. As the expert on the topic it is our job to walk them through things, list the pros and cons of all approaches and listen to what they are really trying to achieve. Then we can make some suggestions on how we can best serve them.