Not Doing What Clients Want

Be customer-centric. Focus on value. Provide a magical experience. Make sure your clients’ needs and wants are fulfilled. Really? How big is actually the gap between theory and practice?

The marketing world is full of buzzwords. Whatever feels cozy and magnetizes the awareness aka attracts the attention span of the goldfish-minded individual is considered innovative, trendy and cool. While that might be dandy in the mainstream world, our senses pick up a distortet vibration and signal an entirely different information to the cells.

What marketing experts all too often disregard aka consciously or unconsciously go without noticing, is the sensitivity and level of perception more and more individuals are prone to tune in.

Clients aren’t as dumb as advertising agencies and marketing moguls consider them to be.

When that sizzling of dishonesty and the rusty taste of that lack of integrity is left in the energetic field of the deal, something nasty remains in the air. While digging for the cause might be considered noble, it’s often the unspoken truth of somebodies wants not being met or even stepped over, whether that’s due to ignorance, a weakness in communication skills or blatant human error.

Should You Listen to Your Clients?

A brilliant yet highly controversial business magnate once said …

“Some people say, “Give the customers what they want.” But that’s not my approach. Our job is to figure out what they’re going to want before they do. I think Henry Ford once said, “If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have told me, ‘A faster horse!'” People don’t know what they want until you show it to them. That’s why I never rely on market research. Our task is to read things that are not yet on the page.”

— Steve Jobs, Co-Founder and Former CEO of Apple

Whether you consider the insights quenched in the above statement that comprise some pretty powerful wisdom nuggets on human psychology by two individuals who have achieved extraordinary success worthy of your attention or not, you have to admit that the quote touches on a sensitive aspect of business and entrepreneurship many so called experts like to avoid.

So, with all cards on deck, should you listen to your clients? Do these folks really know what they utmost desire, need and want?

Ignorance is a bliss, isn’t it? Maybe in certain areas of your life, if you choose so but definitely not in business.

Some clients believe it or not actually know what they want. They’ve been burned so many times that they finally figured out that piece in the puzzle that will unlock the doors to XYZ.

A vast majority of people however, really struggle when it comes to articulating what they desire, need and want. In many cases this comes down to a lack of vision and self-confidence, fear of uncertainty, unclear goals or some fairytale-like beliefs such as for example that shortcuts will get them quicker from A to Z.

What surprises most is the fact that lack of experience, skills and knowledge aren’t those hard bricks that keep you broke and running faster in the hamster wheel of business, and ultimately life.

Level Up Your Mental, Emotional, Physical and Spiritual Game

First you level up, than you see.

Let me reframe this statement to make it more clear:

Your clients’ frustrations, pains, problems, desires, wants, needs, you name it could be bluntly in your face, and yet you won’t be able to see them if you’re not coming from a higher level of awareness.

EXAMPLE:

A level 4 problem can’t be seen and solved by a level 3 mind. You need to get to at least level 4 to comprehend what your client is communicating to you. In order to provide solutions though, you’ll need to level up to at least a 5. Once you reach say level 7 or 8, you might realize that your clients’ issue is actually a level 2 thing that can be solved with a few simple tweaks.

The quest for growth, constant learning and discovering is not a selfish journey. On the contrary, in the end it benefits those you work and live with on a daily basis.

Whether Steve Jobs or Henry Ford are right or wrong is irrelevant.

What matters most is how you approach your clients from a psychological point of view. Human behavior speaks louder than traits and words.

Image by Dean Moriarty on Pixabay

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Originally published on my blog at StrengthInBusiness.com.