How to find out what your customers want

by Pam Mitchell

What is the secret of success in your market? Most business people tell me, "Our market is different. Our marketplace is brutal. Customers want more value for less money each year."  Sound familiar? Then perhaps your market is not so different. So how do we survive and thrive under these hyper-competitive conditions?

If we look at high performance companies throughout history, we can see a common thread to their success. High performance companies earn market share by becoming the value leaders in their market niche. This makes infinite sense when we look at personal and business buying decisions that we make. We always purchase that product or service that offers us the most value among our choices. In other words, the marketplace votes in the market leader with their purchasing dollars.

Most business leaders assume they already know what their customers value. But how can they be sure? How many companies have led the market for 10 years? For 50 years? The market leaders are constantly changing, because the source of the better idea is constantly changing.

In order to be the value leader in our market, we must clearly understand what the marketplace values. Point this out at any meeting, and you'll likely hear. "You're right, let's do a customer survey!" 

But wait! Surveys may be effective for understanding how customers rate us in specific areas, but they tell us so little about what product features or additional services customers may value or how they make buying decisions.

Just look at the last customer survey your company did. Most surveys contain a page-long laundry list of categories like "customer service" in which customers are expected to rate the supplier on a scale from one to five. But what you really want to know is what you can change to make your product or service that of choice in the marketplace. These one to five ratings do little to answer that question for you.

This year, instead of bothering your customers in the middle of their productive workday to survey them, consider holding a customer symposium to better understand how you can truly partner with your customers and solve their problems.

Consumer companies have been using focus groups for decades to fully understand customers' reactions to new product ideas. A customer symposium is similar to this process with a few differences:
1. Symposiums are used in business-to-business relationships.
2. Participants usually represent or could represent a significant percentage of the supplier's revenue.
3. Participants come together to learn from their colleagues in a like profession or industry, not just to educate their suppliers. There is something in it for them.

Most symposium sponsors learn things about their customers that they never thought about. Just listening to the think tank tends to spur their creative juices to solve customer problems and to help them become competitive in their marketplace.

How to organize a symposium
1. First, you need to make sure that your entire organization understands that the purpose of the symposium is market research. There will always be a faction that wants to sell something at the symposium. Resist them and the temptation to offend your attendees.

Many companies increase their business with many of the attendees, but this happens because they have a better understanding of each other after the symposium, not because anything was sold to them.

2. A typical group size is 8 to 20 attendees. Schedule the event at least four months in advance. Invite current customers and prospects. Prospects will have a different perspective than current customers. Always count on 10 percent last-minute cancellations.

3. Most groups left on their own will allow the discussion to drift from topic to topic like a cocktail party conversation. Using an outside professional will make the day more productive and demonstrate your neutrality. They will also ensure the day is for fact finding, not for making sales.

4. While it is not necessary, I recommend a desirable location, like a beach, golf or mountain retreat. The location can attract more of the right attendees and create a relaxed environment that advances creative thinking.

5. Create a proposed agenda, and then solicit agenda input from the confirmed attendees.

6. Make it fun. Create social events: dinners, golf outings, boat trips, etc. The information sharing goes beyond the formal meeting setting, and this is an excellent time for you build personal relationships.

7. Document the salient points and distribute the notes to the attendees.

8. Make sure that you invite both decision-makers and workers to the meeting. There is a tendency to invite executives only, but they are not always the people with the challenges. Explain to the decision-makers what you are trying to learn. Ask them if they would like to send someone on their staff as a reward for a job well done.

9. Most symposium sponsors pay for the attendees' accommodations and include an extra night for fun at the end of the event. Some will pay for airfare and a rental car. Most will invite spouses to the social events.

I have been involved with many types of market research gathering. The cost of a symposium with a small group is generally about the same as a marketing survey to the entire customer base. However, surveys are flat. You never get to ask "why," and people hate to complete surveys. People love to attend symposiums. They generally leave energized by what they have contributed and by what they have learned from their peers. With a symposium, your sample size is much smaller, but your information is much deeper.

The benefits to the sponsor are:
1. a clearer understanding of your customers' and prospects' challenges;
2. many creative ideas to beat the competition and serve the customers better; and
3. improved relationships with customers and prospects.

So the next time you are in a meeting, and someone wants to update that customer survey, suggest a symposium.

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