To understand your customers look in the mirror
By Jon Swanson
You wonder about your customers, whey they don’t come back, why they choose others. But look at how you function… as a customer.
Not for your business, but for your personal life (and I know, small business owners have no personal life. But just pretend with me for a moment).
When you need gas, how do you choose?
When someone ignores you at a store, how do you feel?
When you walk into a store, do you want help or do you want to find it yourself?
Now that you are thinking about how you are, remember that there are a billion people NOT like you. If you have tailored the shopping experience in your business to match your preferences, there may be some of those 1 billion people who will feel very uncomfortable and will not want to come back.
So as you think through the shopping experience in your business, think about people like you… and people who are the opposite.
Jon Swanson is your customer, presenting every day perspectives in a new way. He was a regular contributor to the Great Big Small Business Show podcast, as the Entrepreneurial Chicken. Jon is the author of the best small business post ever.
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Jon has been a regular reader and occasional contributor around here since 2006. Jon works as a pastor, but he understands business better than many so-called business people. He gets that it is about people, relationships, service, and yes, even love.
I think the title says it all. To many times we get caught up in what we want, but through proper testing we may always be able to find what our customers want.
Thanks, Mark. Glad you mentioned testing our assumptions about customer needs and wants. Great point!