Most companies know they should be interviewing customers to understand their needs. But how many have changed behavior? Are most of your new-product teams out there doing great interviews when no one is looking? The knowing-doing gap is the corporate version of the New Year’s resolution, with results just as impressive.
More in article, Where New Product Ideas Begin (Originally published in B2B Organic Growth newsletter).
If the customer felt they helped you with your interview, you probably wasted your airfare. But if they felt it was their interview, asked for a copy of the notes, and said you were a good meeting facilitator… you probably learned things your competitors don’t know. B2B insight skills are needed for this. Do your people have them?
More in e-book, Reinventing VOC for B2B (page 9).
Some companies rely on a handful of internal VOC (voice-of-customer) experts to interview customers. You’ll do far better if you train a critical mass of employees—who routinely interact with customers anyway—to gather customer needs. Keep your VOC experts as coaches and trainers, but implement “VOC for the masses.”
More in executive briefing, Seven Mistakes that Stunt Organic Growth
With apologies to Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina… all great voice-of-customer interviews are alike in the same way: The customer is talking during most of the interview. And they are talking about those outcomes (desired end results) they want to talk about. Anything else is clutter, much of which leads to unhappiness.
More in article, The Missing Objective in B2B VOC (Originally published in B2B Organic Growth Newsletter)