The Voice of the Client

When a client communicates their experience with you, your team and your organization, are you hearing their message and really listening?

Sharing good experiences with your company and complimenting your team is great to hear.   What are they actually trying to tell you?   How do you react to the compliment?

Listen to what they are sharing with you.   Understand what sets you and your team apart.   Is it the process, the people, the leader, the relationship, the experience in general or a combination that results in the client paying the compliment.

What if the message is neutral as in yes we had an OK experience with your Team?   How do you respond?   Asking questions to further understand what they liked and did not like and drilling down to understand what their expectations were will help to provide a better experience in the future.  Qualifying, understanding and setting expectations are all critical in setting the stage for continued success.

We dislike the negative and candid feedback.   How do you handle this?   These are the clients that care the most about your organization and are educating you to do better.   You probably do not believe this and kid yourself in saying "this does not happen to us".   That is OK and you can keep telling yourself this while great teams embrace it and take care of their clients.

Listen to the voice of the client.   We have heard the expression "there are three sides to every story:  yours, mine and somewhere between is the truth".  Here is golden nugget for you:  the reality is the perception of the client about their experience with your business and the proof is in the voice of the client.   Be very thankful if and when they communicate to you.   The alternative of not communicating, leaving you and moving on to build a relationship with someone else is not the option you want.

We are very fortunate our clients communicate with our team and we respond in a professional timely manner.   We welcome and embrace the voice of our clientele to solidify our long term relationships and to create new opportunities from their referrals.

The good news is the compliments and positive experiences communicated to us out-weigh the neutral and any negative feedback.   Thank you to all our clients for sharing their voice and to our team for listening and responding to keep on striving for excellence.

What are you hearing when you listen the voice of your client?