Why Customer Centricity Is the Key to a Competitive Advantage

To develop a booming business in today’s world, there are many factors that you have to put into place. One of such crucial factors is the customers. In more recent times than previously, more emphasis is being placed on the customer experience with a brand or business being personalized and positive. Organizations across different industries are starting to do more to improve their customer experience. This will help them to develop a loyal customer base and also differentiate the brand from its competitors in the market.

The key for any organization to achieve a positive and personalized experience for their customers is having a business model that revolves around customer-centricity. Having a customer-centric business model and culture makes it easier for your employees to pay more attention to your customers. In return, you will have a loyal customer base and a competitive edge over your rivals.

Customer centricity is not just ‘talks,’ it also has a robust financial appeal for your business. One recent study noted that a little increase in positive customer experience could lead to additional revenue increase worth $823m within the space of three years, for a big company with average annual revenue of $1 billion. Another study also shows that companies lose as much as $98 billion annually because they fail to provide a better customer experience in their business. So, as much as customer centricity is in the customers’ interest, it favors the company’s interest even more.

So, what then is customer-centricity? How is it defined?

Customer Centricity – What It Means

According to Gary Geldart, a business CEO and author at BrillAssignmentand college paper, customer centricity involves everyone within the business organization structure thinking of how their decisions and actions can affect the experiences of the customers.

It is a mindset that an organization has that put the customer as the focal point of their business, rather than their product and service, or sales. Any business organization with a culture of customer-centricity will never think of the experience of its customers as an afterthought or the result of their customer service. They have a strategic and intentionally planned customer experience, which marks them out from their competition. Everybody within the organization’s structure seeks to create a nice experience that pleases the customers – whether or not they come in direct contact with the customers. The customer is the priority, and all steps, processes, and decisions are made in their favor.

Importance of Being Customer-Centric

Many businesses are built in a way that success is dependent on how much sales they make – whether to individuals or other organizations. For this reason, they must be able to create a positive experience for their customers throughout. To be effective with this, every member of the organization –whether they interact with the customers directly or not – must be on board. The work of all employees should be defined and designed to play their little part in the organization as a whole being customer-centric and pleasing their customers. Even if it’s an assignment help writer providing thesis writing help for the company, they have to be on board with the organization and fulfill their role which is a bigger goal, customer-centricity.

As mentioned earlier, customer-centricity is not only favorable to the customers. It also helps the company massively and gives it a competitive edge over its rivals. Here are a few benefits of customer centricity for a business organization.

• Customer-centric companies make more profit than other companies that do not focus on customers.
• They can retain more of their customers and attract new ones more easily. Customer loyalty to the brand is usually high as they are satisfied with the products, service, experience, etc.
• They tend to outperform other rival non-customer centric business organizations.
• Customer-centric companies have happier and more satisfied employees than other companies that do not focus on customers. In one survey, 93% of customer-centric companies have their employees glad to continue working with the company. This is in stark contrast to 20% of employees in other non-customer centric companies.
• Customers are more satisfied with their experience and product from customer-centric companies, making much more sales.

How to Create a Culture of Customer Centricity in Your Business

In a customer-centric organization, everybody understands the customer’s prioritizing and focuses on it because it is essential for the long-term success of the business. So, the decision-making and thinking processes always put the customer at the center to provide a quality experience. To create that culture of customer centricity within a business, you have to continually create awareness within the employees so that this culture sticks. They are able to uphold it even when no one is watching them. This will make it a part of them, and they will pass it on to future employees and become ingrained in the organization’s culture. To achieve this, here are a few things you can do:

Make everybody work as a team

This cannot be overstated. It takes teamwork to achieve customer-centricity in your business. If different departments and individuals only consider how to please the customers with their role or duty, it won’t go far. Everybody has to find the other, and every department has to consider the work of another department to achieve this goal. Every department and individual has input in delivering the products or services to the customer. So everyone has to work as a team, as well as individuals, while ensuring that the customers remain the priority. This will require more interaction within the different departments.

Seek everyone’s input

To achieve something like this, you must first put it in the people’s thoughts before you see it in their actions. The best way to put the customers in your employees’ opinions is to ask them for their input. The more they think of ways to improve customer experience, the more customer-centric they get. Another advantage of this is that it provides you with different perspectives on how to go about achieving this goal. All of these perspectives have to be respected and put into perspective.

Align behaviors

Since you are trying to build a new culture, it’s essential to start to carry out specific actions in line with the culture you are developing. This means that there are many things that your employees did not use to do before that they now have to start regularly doing. In the same vein, there are some actions that they used to carry out that they now have to stop. You must make sure that the new thought pattern (which is customer-centricity) aligns with the people’s actions and behaviors. You have to ensure that everybody knows what they need and how exactly they have to do it.

Always promote the vision

In trying to achieve something like this, you can’t focus on goals alone. You have to make sure that everyone sees the vision and feel like they can be a part of it. You must continue to demonstrate this goal and share them consistently. Goals can be forgotten very quickly if the vision is not at the top of the mind. That’s why it is vital to share. An understanding of the view can be the driving force that your employees need to think and act in to promote positive customer experience.

Develop confidence

There might be times when employees need some help to understand their role in this ‘new’ customer-centric approach in their job. Be sure to provide all the support and help that they need. Certain people will indeed require more help than the others, but that’s the more reason to be closer to them and let them see that support and also know that everyone is growing together and learning how to be customer-centric. This does not call for any criticisms and focus more on positivity instead of the negativity. This will go a long way to develop their confidence in being in learning to become customer-centric.

Provide training for customer centricity

This is something that they are new to, so you don’t expect that they catch up instantly and become customer-centric all of a sudden. It takes a process, and it requires some time. A big part of the process is the learning process, and again, you play a significant role in this. As much as you provide the right atmosphere for your colleague to be customer-centric, you also have to offer them with customer-centric training to increase their knowledge and skills; and learn customer-centric behaviors.

Conclusion

There are not many win-win situations and policies for a business organization to adopt, like customer-centricity. It is the surest way for a business to grow fast, make more sales and profit, generate more revenues, and have satisfied employees and loyal customers. The list goes on and on. All of this put the business in a more comfortable position, which gives them a competitive edge over their rivals, especially the non-customer centric ones.

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