Recognising your customer’s needs

Recognising your customer’s needs

We can easily categorise customers into ‘types of issue’ – customers who want to make a complaint, customers who want to resubscribe, or customers who want to make a payment. This can be helpful, but it also means we focus on the issue or question alone rather than uncovering and recognising the unique and individual needs of each customer. This can result in a robotic and process-driven experience for the customer.

In his best-selling book, ‘To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Motivating Others’, Dan Pink talks about being a problem-finder rather than a problem-solver. Being a problem-finder means using your expertise to dig beyond the superficial facts that lead us to jump to conclusions. This could unearth another layer of complexity to the customer’s issue, or a need that you can fulfil, or a potential problem that might crop up later for the customer – a problem you could head off at the pass.

Problem-finders uncover how the situation or issue is affecting the customer and how it makes them feel. It’s looking for both facts and feelings.

Asking well-considered and meaningful questions helps you genuinely understand the customer, see their perspective and understand their motivations or what they need from you.

With this insight, you can provide a strong solution that truly meets your customer’s unique needs.

This learning tip comes from our ‘GREAT customer service’ programme. Check it out here. If you’d like to explore this topic or any other aspect of customer service training then please do give us a call on 01582 463464. We’re always here to help.