We’re all guilty of making assumptions about our customers. It’s a fact of life – we often jump headstrong into situation after situation with certain expectations and end results in mind – and we get disappointed time and time again. Why is that?
Is it unrealistic expectations? Is it wrong assumptions? Is it a wrong approach or jaded viewpoint?
Maybe.
I can’t speak to your personal psychological perspective, but I can tell you a common dilemma that I see my clients face on a nearly daily basis. That is the assumption that customers know what to do or how to interact with what you’re selling.
Tonight, for instance, my business partner and I worked well into the night working on a specific database project for a client. This project is going to change their world. It’s going to bring them notoriety and convenience, efficiency and frankly save them time hand over fist. Problem was, we assumed that the client gave us the data in a format we could use – the correct format. We assumed the client understood what it was they were buying. We assumed a lot of things about the data, the client, the situation. In the end, few of them were correct. So, we spent the better part of the project breaking our own assumptions. Once we did that, the project wasn’t really that difficult… it was just a matter of doing what we know how to do without the barrier of the assumptions.
Doesn’t make sense? How about this. A high end interior fabric store buys the latest trends in fabric. They shop High Point and Atlanta and New York and they have in store the fabrics that will be shown in the top magazines in coming months. They stock the store, price it right and wait for the masses to buy. The people come. The people go. They don’t buy as they should.
What’s the problem? It’s not a problem of customer volume or product or even in-store experience. All of those bases are covered. The problem is that the store owners assume that their customers will share their vision – that they will see how to use the product, they will be able to visualize it in their homes, they will have ideas and creative energy to know what exactly to do with the product this store is selling!
That’s a bad assumption because… the customer does NOT know what to do. They never do.
You might as well start each and every day with a new assumption – ASSUME the customer NEVER knows what to do with your product, service and experience. When you start with that assumption, your business experience will thrive. Instead of buying fabric, you will soon be selling ideas and an idea based experience. You will educate, create, and imagine. Your job will become the giver of the vision. Assume that your customer is clueless. Assume they don’t have any good sense. When you are wrong in your assumptions – it will be a pleasant surprise. But most of the time you’ll be correct – and you’ll win in business.
So try this tomorrow, change your small business strategy to a new assumption. And seek to educate and inspire – whether you are trying to deliver health food or home improvement products, gifts or baby clothes, shoes or wedding gowns, hardware or hotel nights. Assume the worst case and seek to remedy that situation with each and every customer interaction.
Your business will benefit – the results will be immediate.
Great post! Its a common misconception that our customers know what to do with our product/ marketing. The point: don’t make your customers think! Spell things out for them!
Great post!