(Time to read this Blog article is about 60 seconds)
Ultimately, customer ownership is all about creating, delivering and communicating compelling value. Value that ‘grabs’ our target customers, clearly differentness us from our competitors, makes us ‘famous’…and grows our bottom line.
Customers demand value and every business promises it. But there’s a huge lack of clarity about what value really is.
Let’s keep it simple; there are only 3 kinds of Value…Functional, Emotional and Financial Value. That’s it!
- We deliver Functional Value when we…
– sell products and services that actually work for our target customers.
– are open or available when they need us.
– provide the information, coaching and encouragement that they need to wisely choose and effectively use the products or services that we sell. Be the ‘Caring Coach’.
– create policies and processes that make us easy, efficient and consistent to do business with. - Next is Emotional Value. Most business people struggle with this one. They think it’s some airy-fairy thing that can’t be defined…and they’re dead wrong!
Quite simply, we deliver Emotional Value when our customers feel better about themselves and the world every time they do business with us, and every time they use what they bought from us. That’s it! It’s about how they feel. If we’re not delivering Emotional Value, we’re not really ‘connecting’ with our customers. People will always remember how we made them feel.
- Financial Value is #3. Most businesses put it as #1, but it has to be #3, because it’s a function of the previous two.
We deliver Financial Value when our customers believe that they paid a fair and competitive price for all of the functional and emotional value that they get from us. If we don’t deliver functional and emotional value, there can be no Financial Value.
So, the question is, are you delivering and effectively communicating the compelling combination of functional, emotional and financial value required to grab your target customers, clearly differentiate you from your competitors, make you ‘famous’…and grow your bottom line? If not, what needs fixing, who will do it…and by when?
