What customers want most is their own success

Successful businesses enable an outcome their customers regard as success. These businesses are crystal clear about that outcome. And they build their business around enabling it. But what is that outcome?

Whenever someone buys a product or service, they have an outcome to achieve. Think about anything people spend money on, and there’ll be an outcome it addresses. They buy a hamburger to be full; they buy a movie ticket to be entertained; they buy a sports car to be noticed.

The same is true in selling products and services to other businesses – B2B. There’s always an outcome a business wants to achieve when they buy something from a supplier.

Defining the Outcome

In business, there are two types of outcomes. The first is a product outcome. Product outcomes are the direct benefit of using a supplier’s products or services. But using a supplier’s products or services isn’t an end in itself. It’s a means to a bigger outcome the customer wants.

To illustrate, imagine someone going to a hardware store to buy a drill bit. The hardware store manager knows the person doesn’t want to own a drill bit for its own sake. The person wants to drill a hole in the wall. The direct benefit of owning a drill bit is the hole in the wall. The hole is the product outcome.

But the customer doesn’t want a hole in the wall for its own sake either. They want to hang a photo or picture – perhaps a family photo. A hole in the wall isn’t success. The family photo hanging on the lounge room wall is what the customer regards as success.

Restaurants provide another example. The restaurant offers good food and service. People want to enjoy the food and service. Enjoying the food is the product outcome – the direct benefit of the restaurant’s product and service.

But people don’t go to the restaurant for the food alone. They go for an enjoyable evening with family or friends, or perhaps for a business meeting. Success is a good evening out, or a successful business meal. Enjoyable food is part of the equation, but not enough by itself.

So, the second and most important type of outcome is a success outcome. It’s the bigger outcome the supplier’s products or services enable. It’s what the customer really wants. It’s what they’re trying to achieve when they buy products or services. The success outcome is the picture hanging on the lounge room wall or the enjoyable night out.

Product outcomes are necessary but not sufficient to achieve a success outcome. The relationship between product outcomes and success outcomes looks like this –

Why Focus on Success Outcomes?

Some businesses might argue that if they provide a great product or service, they’ve done everything they can. After that it’s up to the customer to do what’s needed for any bigger outcome the customer wants. Other businesses have moved beyond that thinking.

There are four reasons successful businesses focus on their customer’s success outcome.

1. Reduce risk to their revenue – If a customer doesn’t achieve their success outcome, they may not buy more products and services from the supplier. Enabling the success outcome reduces the risk of that happening. Let’s illustrate with the hardware store and restaurant examples.

The homeowner bought a drill bit from the hardware store. But he made a mess of drilling the hole. He chose the wrong place on the wall. The picture looked out of place. The homeowner felt disappointed. Even though the drill bit worked perfectly, the customer didn’t achieve success. The next time he wanted to hang a picture, he didn’t buy anything from the hardware store. He hired a handyman to do the job. And that cost the hardware store future revenue.

The family went to the restaurant for a night out together. The parents wanted to bond with the kids. They sat at their table and the kids pulled out their phones and wouldn’t engage with their parents. The restaurant served great food which they all enjoyed. But the parents didn’t enjoy success. They didn’t bond with the kids. So, they didn’t go back to that restaurant. It wasn’t the restaurant’s fault the kids wouldn’t get off their phones, but it cost the restaurant future revenue.

In both cases, a failure of the customer to achieve success cost the business future revenue.

2. Differentiate – Customers care about their success outcome. It’s what they want to achieve. They don’t really care about a supplier’s products or services, except as a means to their success outcome.

Imagine a supplier with a great product or service competing for a new customer. The supplier talks about their product or service. They can articulate why their offering is best, and the benefits of using their product or service. But the customer yawns. He/she doesn’t care about the product. The customer only cares about the outcome they want to achieve.

Now consider a different supplier. They talk to the customer about the success outcome. They know the customer wants the success outcome. The vendor explains how they enable that success outcome. And the supplier then has the customer hooked. It’s what the customer’s been waiting for – someone who understands what the customer really wants to achieve.

3. Growth – Businesses which are clear about the success outcome they serve have a new insight into products and services they can provide. The simplest thing they can do is make a list of everything the customer needs to achieve their success outcome. Anything the supplier doesn’t already provide is a new product or service they could offer. And because the new products and services are needed for the customer’s success outcome, the customer is more likely to accept them.

4. Customer Loyalty – If a supplier enables the thing the customer really cares about (the success outcome), the customer will love them. And even if a competitor has a better product or service, the customer won’t switch. As long as the customer believes the current supplier is best able to deliver the success outcome, they’ll stay loyal.

What Can a Supplier Do to Enable the Success Outcome?

Suppliers who understand what their customers regard as success do more to ensure the customer achieves that success.

Let’s go back to the hardware store. There’s a new manager of the store. She’s a bit smarter than some of the previous managers. Instead of just providing the customer with what they asked for, the staff now engage in light conversation and ask what the project is.

When the homeowner who wants to hang a picture comes into the store, he learns there are six different methods for hanging a picture. He doesn’t buy a drill bit, he buys a stick-on hanger. And the store provides a guide on how to best position a picture in a room. The homeowner achieves success. And the next time there’s a project, the homeowner goes straight back to that hardware store.

The restaurant also has a new manager. He’s realised that as a family restaurant it’s all about the bonding of the family. And he knows he can’t stop the kids using their phones. So, he has an app that families can use while they’re in the restaurant.

It’s a fun quiz and requires the use of the phone. Now the family is answering the quiz together. They’re engaged because the winning family gets free ice-cream desserts. The questions are funny, and they’ve got lots of animations.

The family has a great time laughing and answering the questions. And the parents achieve success. They bond with their kids – using a tool that in the past has been an impediment to bonding. Now the family goes to that restaurant every week.

These examples illustrate that with an understanding of what the customer regards as success, small additional things can dramatically improve revenue.

Successful businesses have absolute clarity on what their customers regard as success. And they’ve built their business to enable that success. They’ve used the success outcome they serve to reduce the risk to their revenue, to differentiate from competitors, to identify new opportunities for growth and to increase the loyalty of their customers.

It’s no surprise these businesses enjoy success.

Learn more about Generation 3 Customer Success at www.gen3cs.com and contact Paul at pjh@outcomeleaders.com.  His new book, ‘The Outcome Generation: How a New Generation of Technology Vendors Thrive through True Customer Success’ will be released this month.