Customer Satisfaction - Is It Enough?

Businesses all talk about ensuring customer satisfaction as a priority. They even do detailed and lengthy surveys to determine just how satisfied their customers are - and why? - because we all know the old adage that unhappy customers tell more people of their woes than happy customers do of their joys. Whichever statistics you look at, we all know from our personal experience that the adage feels true. So what do we do about it? Agree standards of service based on the responses we get from the customer satisfaction surveys to get more satisfied customers – that’s what.

But is it enough? In an age where high levels of customer service is increasingly taken for granted the emphasis now is on Customer Loyalty – our research in this field has shown three main benefits from having increased numbers of loyal customers:

1. Increased repeat business
2. Increased recommendations and referrals – improved reputation
3. Increased access to available spend

These three together equal:

1. Increased business growth

Customer Loyalty goes much further than simply satisfying customers; it means ensuring that every interaction with customers, no matter how small, is an opportunity to Delight them. Businesses must re-align their entire operational focus on continually delighting customers otherwise they run the risk of losing them to someone who does!