CUSTOMER ROMANCE: THE BUSINESS OF LOVE

ROMANCE AND THE BUSINESS OF LOVE
For those who have immediately ruled out any good thing emanating from this write-up because they believe romance and business do not go together, I implore you to just read on just a little longer. I know you do not mix business with pleasure but just bear with me. It is said that desperate times call for desperate measures and different times call for different strategies. In the world of business, these are definitely desperately different times. What does a business do in these times of tightening economic times, ever-fickle customers and overly-aggressive competitors? How does a business maintain a steady customer base that remains unwavering and religiously loyal in the face of more enticing offers from more ‘capable foes’? How does a business handle today’s consumers?
Customers of today expect more and tolerate less, simply because they have so many options to choose from. The ICT age has come with attendant opportunities for consumers of today. In times past businesses were the guardians of information pertaining to their activities. This was kept a secret thereby empowering these businesses. Those who know control those who don’t. However, times have changed. Technology has tilted the scales of power into the hands of the consumer. With a click of a button, consumers can have access to all the information they want about almost any business, all from the comforts of their homes and offices. Customers are faced with an ocean of choices among competing businesses and they can shop “where their souls deem fit.” These are truly different times and necessarily demand different strategies.
After much thought into the best strategy a business can adopt I realised the answer lied in an unusual direction-the world of romance. I realised there was a strong semblance in what business leaders are going through in these times to what most young people (and all readers including you) went through in times past in attempting to forefend a competitor over the love of a beautiful damsel or well-built hunk. I am convinced lots of you readers, if not all, will identify with a time when you had to use all legal means at your disposal to keep your sweet love from the powerful grips of another. I have been there and I believe you have been there also. How did you manage to win your love to your side and beat the competitor to it? How were you able to keep your lover’s undying affection inspite of the fact that you might not have been the most ‘endowed’ of all the competitors? Within the answers to these questions lies the way forward for business leaders in these extremely competitive times.
It’s great to be in love, so they say, and so have I experienced. The feeling is beyond description, especially if the love is as fresh as the morning dew. I am sure readers, who have ever been in love, might be feeling nostalgic at this point in time. In thinking about the similarities between maintaining a romantic relationship and establishing a staunch customer base, I found so many instances of similitude that I could not help but put my thoughts and findings on paper. Customer relationship is in very many ways akin to romantic relationships. Your lover, spouse, sweetheart, honey pie, or whatever ‘romantic’ name you decide to call your better-half is in every way your ‘customer’, and a very special customer as that. As Brian Tracy puts it, the purpose of a business is to create and keep customers. What is the essence of well-meaning romantic relationship if it is also not to create and keep a lover for life?
Experts in human relationships, couples that have stayed together for years and almost everybody who has experienced some form of interpersonal relationship agree on one thing-Trust is the single most important ingredient in any relationship. Without trust on the part of the individuals in the relationship, there is no relationship. Trust is central to the strength of any union between two or more people. It is the glue that holds all relationships together. On the island of love, trust is the main currency used. Without trust religion is of null effect. It will take trust on the part of mortal man to have a relationship with an immortal God.
In much the same way, trust is what business is all about. Whenever a customer interacts with a business, be it for a product or for a service being offered, the issue of trust comes to play. Trust either goes up or comes down, whenever a consumer comes in contact with a business. You trust your brand of toothpaste, pomade, spray starch, shoe polish, etc to do what the manufacturers say they would do. You trust your bank to be able to keep your money safe, your insurers to be there for you when you are in need and your physician to prescribe the right medicine when you are ill. Trust is central to all business activities. As consumers are faced daily with a seemingly infinite number of businesses, brands and choices, companies that are seen as trustworthy are one step ahead of the competition. I was faced with the trust issue once during an attempt to convince a customer to open an account with my former employers. This customer honestly confided in me that he would not want to leave his bankers because he was of the view that no matter what happened to banks in Ghana, he was sure that his bank would not go bankrupt. According to him, he had witnessed two banks going down in Ghana but that particular bank had been around for ages. That is the power of trust. It can confidently be concluded that if trust is central to both personal and business relationships, then ways of holding personal relationships together can also be used to hold business relationships together. Customer romance, therefore, is not a far-fetched concept.
To say that customer romance is a new frontier will not be an absolute truism. This is because for decades, if not centuries, smart businesses have been wooing customers and providing them with good ‘romantic’ experiences. However as to it being a widely-recognised and widely-used business strategy, I daresay it would qualify to be a novel experience. Readers will agree, if they give it much thought, that their feelings towards certain products-services they regularly patronise is nothing short of a feeling of love. If you agree that most products are good in their own rights and that even if some are better than others, product quality can always be replicated or even bettered, what then causes you to patronise that one particular product-service? It is the quality of the relationship that the company promises (and fulfils!) to you, the customer. It is the exceptional value you receive from using the product-service that keeps you going back to it. Come to think of it isn’t that what this whole business of love is about.
About the Author
J. N. Halm is an electrifying sales and customer care coach, who works with small and big businesses with their merchandising, staff and management training, customer care and retention strategies, and image management. He is the CEO and Principal Consultant of Exsellers International, LLC, an avant-garde sales training and consulting firm involved in turning around and improving the sales fortunes of its partners through cutting-edge training seminars, recruitment and placement of highly trained sales professionals, and the provision of state-of-the-art sales-boosting products and services.
For details on upcoming training seminars contact:
233-24-3157948/233-27-4930493/exsellersghana@yahoo.com
You can post your comments on his blog@ www.exsellers.blogspot.com