When Amazon first came on the scene everyone thought they were all about taking over the book business…wiping out Barnes and Noble and many others. They weren’t…this wasn’t ever the plan of Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.
Once we got over this idea, everyone then thought they were trying to take over all products and offer them as cheaply as possible…being the ultimate commodity provider. They weren’t…this wasn’t their plan either.
Now that they are a solid part of our lives, we realize what they are all about…giving you and me, the customer, the very best online shopping experience possible…we finally get it. This is what they were designing and building from day one…to make our shopping experience easier, more customer friendly, and offer incredible selection and value. They were all about the CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE from day one!
The secret sauce for Amazon is CUSTOMER OBSESSION.
Back to Jeff Bezos and Amazon…and. You can see how passionate Bezos is about their OBSESSION with the customer by looking at a couple of quotes Jeff has given us that are worth noting, two of these really resonate with me…
“We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.”
“If you do build a great experience, customers tell each other about that. Word of mouth is very powerful.”
Amazon doesn’t just say they want to treat their customers well or that they really appreciate their customers (common rhetoric from most companies), they demonstrate it in everything they do…including their LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES. In fact, their NUMBER ONE PRINCIPLE is very simple…
CUSTOMER OBSESSION – Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers.
Another great leader had the same vision…Steve Jobs from Apple. He wasn’t about trying to make the most technologically advanced computer…his desire was to improve our lives using a variety of forms of technology. One of his most famous quotes tells the same story as Amazon…
“Our DNA is as a consumer company – for that individual customer who’s voting thumbs up or thumbs down. That’s who we think about. And we think that our job is to take responsibility for the complete user experience. And if it’s not up to par, it’s our fault, plain and simple.” –Steve Jobs
If you have ever bought anything from Amazon and had to return it for some reason, they carry this feeling of Customer Obsession through their entire experience…all the way to the very end when they ask you a simple 3 question survey. Here are their 3 questions…
- Rate our Customer Service? (from Terrible to Great)
- How helpful was the Amazon Representative? (Very Unhelpful to Very Helpful)
- What would you like us to improve? (lots of choices)
But even before they ask you to take the survey, they make a very powerful statement to reinforce their commitment to you and to the experience they want you to have. They have a simple statement that is at the top of their survey that says what they live, eat, and breathe…
“Your feedback is helping us build Earth’s most Customer-Centric Company.”
This says it all…what they are about and what they focus on in everything they do. Do they always get it right? Nope…but they get more right than any other company of their size or in their industry and they have this as their “guiding principle” in everything they do…they can only continue to improve…ahead of their competitors. This is what Bezos knew from the very beginning and continues to build upon this foundation. And purchasing Zappos was just another step in this direction (more on that one in another post).
CUSTOMER OBSESSION is when you build your entire company around the customer and their experience is at the center of your universe. All processes, operation, support, sales, marketing, and leadership have this as their guiding light and the foundation upon which their ENTIRE ORGANIZATION is built. This is how Customer Obsession happens inside a company and why those businesses who truly obsess over their customers are the LEADERS IN THEIR INDUSTRY!
But you’re not Amazon…in fact you are most likely an SMB business…small to mid-sized, nimble, and highly competitive. You don’t have the resources of an Amazon…but you have the most valuable resources of all…SPEED AND FLEXIBILITY. You can move faster and make changes happen much quicker than Amazon or any other large company. You can make a decision to be Customer Obsessed tomorrow and put your plans in place quicker than any large company in the market.
You, the Owner or CEO of an SMB company can dominate in your industry faster than almost anyone else you compete with…if you MAKE THE COMMITMENT TO BE CUSTOMER OBSESSED. This isn’t about “saying the words” and then doing what you are doing today or making little changes. It isn’t about telling every employee to be friendlier to the customer. It isn’t about telling your customer how much you care about them. It’s about changing your company at the core…putting the customer first in EVERY DECISION and building ALL YOUR PROCESSES to create and incredible, consistent, and awesome CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE your customers can SEE EVERYDAY.
CUSTOMER OBSESSION IS AN “ALL-IN” STRATEGY!
When you become Customer Obsessed, no longer do you pay “lip service” to your customers and tell them how much they mean to you or how important they are or a bunch of other fancy phrases…YOU SHOW THEM! You demonstrate how important they are in everything you do…every day…with every interaction. You do it to the point where they say…
“WOW, you really care about your customers…everything you do for me is over-the-top incredible. There is no one in your industry that treats me the way you do…I can’t wait to tell others about you.”
When you get this reaction…consistently…you are CUSTOMER OBSESSED! And your employees will love working for you because they are the ones hearing it from your customers. You will have a CUSTOMER CENTRIC CULTURE that your competitors can only envy. You will be the one your customers talk about and tell others about. You will be the recipient of “Word-of-Mouth on Steroids.”
This is HOW YOU CAN BE LIKE AMAZON and dominate your market and industry. Are you up to the challenge that Bezos took on many years ago when he created Amazon? If so, we should talk…I would be happy to share with you what this new world looks like and share with you how others are doing it today. It’s a once in a “business life time” adventure and journey…one that you will never regret and one that will change your company forever!
