Market Creation

Basic Business Cents

Market Creation

In the last column we discussed how merely satisfying customers is not enough, we must provide better service or products than they expect. Their expectations are set by what we and our competitors lead them to believe they can get, so we want their expectations to be around what we offer. The question then is how do we discover the attractive quality features that allow us to delight our customers and become the leader in our field. Obviously it is not easy and it requires a focused effort.

The first step is to carefully define the aim of this effort. Exactly what do we want to achieve? Brainstorm with your key people all the possible objectives that you would like to see develop. Then sort them to define the few key objectives of the process and develop 2 or 3 open-ended questions to discover information on needs and wants in each of the areas.

Just listening “to the voice of your customer is not sufficient.” It is worthwhile to note there are some things your customers will tell you and some things they won’t tell you unless you have a method to obtain it from them. And, of course they may not tell you all their needs because they don’t know themselves but your method might make it clear to them. Also, just listening to your customers is not enough because there are other customers you would like to have that you should learn about their needs and wants.

Next visit with10 to 20 customers, potential customers, and lost customers, making sure you that you have representation of all three groups. Ask them the open questions and listen and record the responses, both verbal and observed body language.

After completion of this step, again meet with your key people and review the notes and select and prioritize the important needs and wants. Work can now begin on ways to satisfy those unmet needs and wants.

When some ideas have crystallized on how to deliver on these customer-delight features, think back to your visits and remember those people who were trying to use your products or service in ways for which they were never intended. Some call them people who “think out of the box.” Dr. Kano calls them “maniac or lead users.” Meet with them as a group, if possible, and bounce new ideas off of them. Again record their responses and note behavior. Not only do you want feedback on your ideas, but also brainstorm with them other things you could or should do. They can become a brain trust for you and will feel ownership in your success. In that way, they also become loyal customers.

The data should be maintained for further analysis and updated as time goes on. This process insures input from every possible source such as existing, new, potential, delighted, satisfied, unhappy, and lost customers. The data should also reflect whether they are a lead, mainstream, or trailing users, different sizes, different markets, so on and so forth.

Dr. Deming used to say, “If you want to be ahead, you have to get ahead.” Delighting your customers will make you the leader.

Delighting Your Customers

Basic Business Cents

Attractive Quality Creation

“Satisfying your customers is not enough! Satisfied customers will switch if a competitor offers something better. You must delight your customers so they will remain loyal” and brag about you was a message of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Loyal customers will come to you if they are offered something better by a competitor and give you a chance to improve your offering of product/service. The difference between satisfied customers and loyal customers is best described by Professor Emeritus of the Science University of Tokyo Noriaki Kano in his work he calls Attractive Quality Creation. His work of almost twenty years is summarized in the following chart:

Kano uses the word Neutral for what I think of as being Satisfied and he uses the word Delight for what Deming calls Loyal. He says there are three kinds of quality—Must Be, More is Better, and Delighters. Lets use the purchase of a new automobile as an example.

Good brakes are an example of Must Be quality. We expect the new car to have good brakes and if it doesn’t, we will be very unhappy. If it does, so what? We expect good brakes and we are satisfied or neutral.

Gas mileage may be an example of More is Better quality. If the mileage is very poor, we will be dissatisfied. If it is about what we expected we will be satisfied. But if the gas mileage is much better than expected, we will likely brag to our friends and colleagues.

The Delighters are something we don’t expect, and if absent, so what, we were not expecting them and we are still satisfied. But when they are present and we like them, they become something of which we are proud and want to share the good news with our friends. An example from the original Ford Taurus was cup holders and nets in the trunk to keep grocery bags from tipping over. Today it might be built-in global positioning unit (GPS), outside temperature gauge, or back-up mirror. Note from the cup holder example, Delighters migrate to Must Be features.

Sounds simple. All we have to do is know how to measure customer satisfaction and identify new features to delight customers. Ah, material for future columns.