Seeing your business through your customer's eyes

- One of the advantages of owning a small business, in particular, in comparison with large businesses, is that you are close to your customer. You have the ability to get to know what it is that they really want and cater to that experience, but many entrepreneurs fail to take advantage of this great opportunity. So, in this video, I want to walk you through a worksheet. You can download this from the exercise files of this course. Start with yourself.

We're going to look at the customer experience and you're going to go through every part of it. Imagine that you're a customer visiting your business for the first time. And you're going to go through every touch point of that business. What's a touch point? Well, it's the place where you connect, where you make contact with the customer. Go through every aspect of this worksheet. What it's like to talk to people on the phones.

What's the exterior of your business like? What's the interior like? How was your website or your social media presence? What are your printed materials like and how are your products and services interacting with you as the customer? Make notes, in particular, of things that maybe you would improve. Things that you don't necessarily like about the experience. Now, this process is going to take you some time. I'd recommend that you budget about an hour or two for this process.

Now, it's nice for you as the business owner to go through this. It is valuable. But it's not as valuable as having other people go through it. Why? Well, you've been involved in this business too long. You're a little bit biased as you go through this. So, it's better for you to ask others. In particular, people who fit your most valuable customer profile. Who's the most valuable customer? These are the people who are most likely to buy your product that is most profitable for your business.

So, you find people who fit this profile and you have them go through this process and complete the worksheet. What are things that they didn't like? What are things that they would improve? You can also hire secret shoppers. There are businesses that provide this service to other people. Also, there is an option of hiring live online feedback. Getting people to look at your website and comment as they're trying to navigate. Keep in mind that whatever you choose, you're going to need to make some kind of investment.

Even if you're just asking people who fit your most valuable customer profile, give them something for helping you out. It's well worth it. Large companies spend tens of thousands of dollars to get this feedback. All you need to do is give them a gift certificate or something like that. Now, after you go through this process and have other people go through this process, let's say you get five responses, then look through the notes and choose one thing that you're going to improve in your business.

You may have a laundry list of 10 to 20 different things that need to improve. That can be overwhelming, so pick just one and improve that. Then come back to the list and choose another. Lots of small improvements will lead up to a big improvement overall in your business. The difference between good small businesses and excellent small businesses, is often the investment they make in the customer experience.

Going through this process may take you some time, but it is well worth it.