The Fickle Customer

The Fickle Customer

I have always viewed my son as my customer and sometimes, employee. I manage his growth, meet his demands, ensure the ROI of his young life (he’ll be responsible for it later).

Last week, on a school night that ended late, he requested, pleaded—implored that we have spaghetti and meatballs. Mind you, this request is truly three standard deviations from the usual dinner suspects. I tried the local pizza take-out route with no luck, so I was left winging it.

Let me just say, I had NEVER made meatballs before.

It’s 6:30 and I found myself buying ground meat. I think we all get the picture. There is still the ‘get the kid ready for bed’ process that needs to be carefully timed against that looming 8 p.m. bedtime deadline.

About an hour later, he’s showered, in pjs and meatballs are on the plate – complete with red sauce and a pile of spaghetti. Phew – I’ve met expectations, delivered on time and on budget. My client will be so pleased.

One look, one small bite and this tiny tyrant of a customer informs me that he FORGOT—he doesn’t really LIKE meatballs. Fickle.

* * * * *

We’ve all had them – customers that make us jump through hoops of fire while juggling sharp blades only to inform us that ‘eh, that’s not what I was looking for’. Or, worse yet, they keep changing their minds….pushing further and further, frustrating us while scope-creeping us into “Would you like fries with that?” wages.

We call this business you don’t want. And while we still end up with business we don’t want, we’ve gotten better at avoiding or ameliorating it.

Here are some tips to running your client relationships the way you both will feel satisfied and successful:

• Set, document and agree to clear objectives.

• Develop and agree to metrics.

• Get signoffs at milestones.

• Communicate status, progress, and potential issues in a timely manner.

• Have the post-mortem check-up – find out want went well and what needs improvement.

And lastly, remember that your relationship is win/win.

As a customer-driven organization, Summit strives for 100% referenceable customers. But while we do what it takes to get it done for our customers, they have to measure up too.

Good marketing isn’t a commodity. Our customer referenceability metric assumes our customer will want to continue to work with us—that good work should perpetuate our relationship.

As for my meatball son, he has a captive vendor in me. I have a different set of tips for dealing with him.

Get yourself a little MarketingSMACK! at www.marketingsmack.wordpress.com

Or, visit us at: www.summitstrategypartners.com

Jack

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