Whether it be to customers or partners (people who sell on your behalf), the communication of your business value is critical. But before you can communicate it, you must understand it, a process that never stops, as it is forever changing.
In many cases, the brand says it all; for example, Apple, Microsoft, Rolls-Royce at one end, or Walmart (Asda), Aldi, EasyJet or Ryan Air at the other.
Understanding your business value starts and finishes by listening to what your customers are saying. We’ve facilitated a number of workshops on this subject, and the opening question is always “Can someone give me a real example of business value that your organisation has delivered to a customer?” The silence that follows is often long and embarrassing. When Les Yuen took up the role of Sales & Marketing Director with Get To Great® this was the first question he asked me, and although I could give him anecdotal evidence, I was lacking hard facts and figures. That is no longer the case.
In the business to consumer (B2C) world, some organisations allow their customers to publicly comment on the value they deliver, for example, eBay, Amazon and TripAdvisor, whereby customers can comment on the products and services sourced through these organisations. Any organisation using these websites to sell their products and services realises the implications of delivering value, but also, the downside of failing.
Business to business (B2B) organisations use mechanisms such as Nett Promotor Score (NPS) to measure customer satisfaction, and the value delivered. They also ask for case studies and testimonials, but these only reflect positive experiences, for obvious reasons!
Communicating (and selling) your business value is surely the starting point for the sales and marketing functions, and we’ll leave you to the many thousands of books on the subject.
How well does your organisation understand, and subsequently, communicate its business value?
The next blog in this series looks at the fourth dimension of a successful growth strategy – Attracting, developing and retaining the appropriate talent.