Everybody knows that the reasons why customers buy from anyone are not solely based on rational decision-making alone. Research is showing that there is a much larger body of evidence that customer choice is based on emotional influence than first thought. The implications of this knowledge is far reaching and will require us to shelve our previous thinking regarding buying, selling and customer service. It also has implications in other areas of business and relationships.
Rational decision-making is used to justify our emotional buying patterns. We frequently delude ourselves that we are being rational when, what we are really doing is justifying and rationalizing our buying decisions.
This is critical in the business world. We need to model our customer service on this simple premise. "Customers purchase products they like from people they like rather than purchasing products they like from people they don't like." This may seem fairly obvious but the obvious implications are largely ignored in business. There are very few businesses that allow their front-line staff to be likeable. Instead, they train them to be rigid, policy orientated and generally unhelpful. This is in the name of customer service.
Where there is a lack of emotional value added by the front line staff, the business is perceived to cold, impersonal and indifferent to the needs of the customers. Customer service is not a logical concept with rules and policies. It can't operate that way. Each member of staff is different and each customer is different and they are both subject to changes as a result of external events. How can you possibly have rules to cover every possible permutation of those factors?
At this point, it is well worth mentioning that our delusion of being rational and logical extends to the matter of price. Every business school attempts to set out a formula for calculating price. This is in the face of a lot of evidence that shows that price is just a function of perceived value. This perceived value comes from our feelings of how important we think this product is to us. We consider price from an emotional standpoint rather than a logical and rational standpoint. Later, if we have made the purchase it is likely that we will use logic and rational thought to justify what we have bought. The decision to buy has been influenced by our emotions not our logic.
If we are going to influence people to buy, we have to influence their emotional side. If we're going to provide excellent customer service, it must be provided to meet the emotional needs of the customers rather than the logical needs. Ask yourself if your business focuses on the logical needs or the emotional needs of your customers and prospective customers. If you are not meeting the emotional needs, then you will find that your customer "churn" will be larger than your competitors who focus on emotional needs.
