Working On Mysteries Without Any Clues

Bob Seger’s song “Night Moves” has great lyrics about being a teenager and young love, which leads to the title of this entry. As a business owner, we’d all like some clues to solve the mystery of: Who is my ideal customer?” The Peninsula Beverly Hills hotel spends a lot of time finding out exactly who their customer is. When you enter the hotel, the staff is “acting on information you’ve given them without even knowing it”. The hotel keeps “a careful record on its guests tastes, as well as what they spend there”. The Managing Director of the hotel also performs his own research. The staff meets to discuss arriving guests, how many times they’ve stayed at the hotel, where they’ve shopped and what they like to do. The bottom line: The Peninsula knows precisely who their customers are, what they want and why they keep coming back.
How do you get clues for your business? Most owners I know seem to have an intuitive feel for who their customers are. They change how they do business- maybe without even realizing it- to improve customer satisfaction. For example, a dry cleaning shop starts opening earlier on Saturday morning because they notice more store traffic early in the day. No one’s complained; they simply notice and make a change. The most effective way to address this issue is to specifically ask clients, preferably through a survey.
The Lesson: Even if you’ve grown your business in recent years, finding out more about your customers may lead to more success faster. The best way to ask clients is through a survey.
Your Homework: What change have you made in your business recently, based on a client comment? Did more than one client make the same comment? Did business increase after the change?
(Source: “The Gatekeeper: How Posh Hotel Sizes Up Guests”, Wall Street Journal, 5/10/07)