Editorial
The Gist
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Deeper conversations matter. Direct interviews reveal customer insights that digital methods often miss.
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Executive views count. Talking with decision-makers uncovers strategic priorities that product users may not see.
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Actionable intelligence grows. In-depth conversations often lead to clearer ideas for improving marketing strategies.
In the ongoing quest to understand why customers purchased a particular solution, marketers have several methods at their disposal to gather customer insights. Many will instinctively focus on digital engagement methods, such as surveys, net promoter scores (NPS), advanced web data analytics or even artificial intelligence.
While these methods may streamline and automate the process, there are drawbacks. First, these mediums usually focus on product users. These users often have a limited understanding of their company’s strategic operations and focus only on how they use your solutions. They tend to suggest lower-value, tactical improvements based on likes and dislikes. In addition, busy professionals are loath to participate in surveys, which skews the results to those who have complaints or are unhappy with your solution.
Marketers should begin focusing on a more thorough and higher-value approach to understanding their customers. This means direct engagement with customer executives through personal interviews or, even better, through well-managed customer advisory board (CAB) initiatives. These mediums give marketers deeper insight into customer challenges, motivations and purchasing decisions. These are types of customer insights that product users may not fully understand.
While such engagement might be considered “old fashioned” by younger, data-driven marketers, the results will likely be richer and more insightful than digital mass communication mediums.
Plus, they can focus more broadly on these six key topics:
Table of Contents
- What Drives Customer Decisions?
- How Do Customers Learn About Solutions?
- What Is Your Customer's Selection and Approval Processes?
- What Happens After a Customer Makes a Purchase?
- How Do You Measure Customer Outcomes?
- Turning Customers Into Advocates
- How Customer Insights Improve Marketing Strategy
What Drives Customer Decisions?
What are your customers’ strategic initiatives that support the purchase of your solutions? What larger challenges are they trying to solve? What are their top pain points, and how does your solution fit in as part of a larger solution?
Related Article: 6 Ways to Get Customer Buy-In for Your Marketing Campaigns
How Do Customers Learn About Solutions?
How do your customers learn about available technology solutions? What mediums influence them the most? How did they become aware of your solution, and what intrigued them to learn more? What materials did they read or engage with (directly from your company or otherwise) to consider your solution? What other solutions did they research and consider?
What Is Your Customer's Selection and Approval Processes?
What are your customers’ processes for evaluating, approving and purchasing solutions? Who are the approvers, influencers and purchasers? How were objections or issues overcome? How/when was your sales team involved?
What Happens After a Customer Makes a Purchase?
How was your solution delivered and implemented? Did this go smoothly or were there any issues? How long did this take? What other systems are connected or used in conjunction with your solution? Was your customer pleased with this process?
How Do You Measure Customer Outcomes?
What has been the result of your customers’ use of your solution(s)? Was their problem completely solved? What quantifiable results have they enjoyed in doing so? How long did it take to realize these benefits?
Related Article: Top Customer Experience Metrics That Matter Today
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Turning Customers Into Advocates
Now that your customer has been successful with your solution, to what extent would they recommend it to others? Would they be willing to be a sales reference for your company? Would they be willing to endorse the publication of a case study or video testimonial posted on your website?
How Customer Insights Improve Marketing Strategy
While these topics can drive engaging and insightful direct interviews, the topics are often more revealing when discussed as a group during well-managed CAB meetings. After all, customers always want to learn from their peers how their company performs compared to others. These insights can be used to justify more staff or budget, and they can lead to additional product use improvements for incremental benefits.
These customer journey insights will not only help customers improve or expand their use of a solution, but they also allow marketers to get a more direct, in-depth understanding of how their customers use and become successful with the solution. This intelligence can be very valuable in implementing operational excellence with their own marketing operations.
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