Anticipate: Knowing What Customers Need Before They Do

Now, there's a rash of business books to help you do this. What's unique about "Anticipate" is that the authors built the book around two proprietary frameworks. These guide you through the process of transforming your customer service approach, and designing a better experience for your customers.

The book is written for professionals in charge of customer service, and the customer experience. The information in here is fairly specialized, and it will be most meaningful for readers who work in some aspect of customer service strategy.

More importantly, it's not written solely for the retail sector. Any business, whether in manufacturing, financial services or the non-profit sector, can use the principles in this book to build stronger customer relationships.

Bill Thomas is the founder of Centric Performance LLC, which provides practical tools for organizations looking to enhance their customer experience. He's also a nationally recognized speaker. Co-author Jeff Tobe is another sought-after speaker and is the founder of Coloring Outside the Lines, a company that helps organizations think more creatively in designing and implementing their customer experience.

So, keep listening to find out why customers' behavior has no bearing on how they feel about your organization, why it's not true that all customers are important, and how to tell when it's time for your organization to take a more in-depth look at customer service.

"Anticipate" has 10 chapters, and is almost 200 pages long. It's not a fat book, but there's a lot of information in here. You'll need to go slowly in order to digest it all.

The authors don't waste any time getting started. Chapter one shows you how to assess your current customer service strategy, and its potential for success. You can do the assessment right in the book, or you can access it online via a computer or your phone.

It's definitely worth your time to take the assessment in chapter one. The insights you learn here will help reshape your strategy as you move further along in the book.

There are 30 questions in the assessment, and they correspond with the two frameworks outlined in the book: the Customer Focus Maturity Model and the Ten Point Customer Focus Framework.

The authors' Ten Point Framework gives you an early clue about what the rest of the book will actually cover.

The 10 elements in the framework are: Strategic Drivers, Customer Segmentation, Customer Engagement, Employee Engagement, Training and Tools, Process Orientation, Joint Workouts, Capacity for Change, Consequences, and Committed Leadership.

The authors say they've never seen a successful customer-centric business strategy that didn't have all of these 10 elements. As you can probably guess, a good deal of the book focuses on how to add and shape these elements within your organization.

The other model they rely on is the Customer Focus Maturity Model. This model is highly visual, and more complex than the Ten Point Framework. According to the authors, the model is used to find the drivers, opportunities, and techniques needed to shape your organization's customer-centric strategy. The goal is to move up through different levels of sophistication, until you reach level three.

Essentially, the Customer Focus Maturity Model sits on top of the 10 elements of the previous framework, dividing that list into three levels. Each level has distinct traps and lessons to be learned. There are also four dimensions that further define the customer relationship.

It's a bit complex to describe because it's so visual, but once you see it in the book it does make sense.

Before we dive into those two models in greater detail let's take a quick look at chapter two, which includes some interesting insights.

This chapter is titled "Doing the Right Things for the Wrong Reasons." And the authors stress an important point here. Your customer focus has to be grounded in, or linked to, your business or growth strategy goals. Happy customers are all well and good. But if they're not inspired or motivated to take action and continue buying from you, then it's not going to do you much good.

Later on in chapter two, the authors talk about the difference between customer behavior, satisfaction, and loyalty. Many organizations believe that if a customer continues to buy from them, he or she is a loyal customer. Their work is done. However, this is far from the truth.

The authors include a personal example to help illustrate what they're talking about here, and what a costly assumption this is.

Close to one of the author's homes is a drugstore. It's the only close drugstore with a drive-through window that's open late. When he has a sick child and needs a prescription filled, this is the only place he goes.

The interesting thing is that the author refuses to go into this drugstore to buy anything. It's always dirty and dusty, the staff is unfriendly, and it's just an unpleasant place to shop. So he avoids shopping here when he can.

The author's point is that his behavior is one of a satisfied customer. He keeps going back. But he's not a satisfied or loyal customer. He goes because he has to, and he only goes for a very specific reason.

It's an important lesson. The way a customer behaves doesn't always indicate how satisfied they are. Behavior won't tell you if they're likely to spend more money with your organization, promote your brand, or not buy from your competitors.

Next, the authors talk about the specific behaviors that define an unsatisfied, satisfied, and loyal customer.

They stress that creating satisfied customers should never be the end goal. Research shows that 60 to 80 percent of defecting customers claim to be satisfied or very satisfied with an organization right before they move on to their competition. Having loyal customers needs to be the ultimate goal.

In chapter three, the authors dispel three common myths in customer service: the customer is always right; whatever it takes, keep them satisfied; and all customers are important.

Let's look at that last one: all customers are important. Most organizations live and breathe by this principle. And in one sense, it's true. All customers are important in terms of the business and referrals they give you, and the way they talk about you to friends and family. But they're not all equally important.

Some customers cost you more to supply, which means you have lower margins. Others generate smaller revenue streams for you. Others cost you in less tangible ways. They might be high-maintenance, or they might do things that weaken your brand.

This is why it's important you know the lifetime value of your customers. Some customers might spend a lot with you, but incur such high costs that it's ultimately not worth keeping them around. Not when you could be investing in customers who might spend less, but contribute more value long-term.

Although we thought this was a great point to bring up, we were disappointed the authors didn't include information on how to figure out the lifetime value of a customer. It would have been a helpful addition in this section.

In chapter four the authors take a closer look at level one in their Customer Focus Maturity Model. Level one is a very basic level. Essentially, this is when you address the challenge of getting customers to stay with you after they've made a purchase. How do you make them satisfied enough to stay?

Most organizations start this process only when they see a risk. Perhaps customer complaints are on the rise, there are lower contract renewal rates, or increased pricing pressures.

They usually make some effort to find out why, often with customer service surveys. But they usually don't go far enough, or probe deeply enough, to find out what the experience is like for satisfied, or dissatisfied, customers.

One of the best ways to get a deep understanding of your customers' experience is a personal interview. The drawback is that it takes courage to ask a customer face-to-face what their experience was like, and this is why so many organizations don't do it. It also takes a lot of effort to interview enough customers to gain a macro or market-wide insight.

But, an interview is one of the most effective ways to probe deeply into how your customers feel about their experience with your organization.

This is only one approach out of many the authors go over in this chapter. And they stress three key points here. First, the best way to gain a better understanding of your customers' experience is to use more than one technique or tool. Second, the best processes, especially surveys, engage customers in their design. And third, customer input is useless, even risky, if you don't do something about it.

The book's subtitle – "Knowing What Customers Need Before They Do" – is a bold claim, and it's addressed in level two of the authors' Customer Focus Maturity Model. The authors stress that every touch point with your customer is an opportunity to learn more about them and, over time, anticipate their future needs.

Level two, which is also called the "teaming level," moves your customer focus journey to the next phase of effectiveness and profitability. Here, you engage customers in a way that uncovers their unstated needs.

This insight can put you and your organization at a distinct advantage over your competitors. You also learn how to stay on top of those needs as they evolve.

So, level one shows you how to gather input. Level two shows you how to get involved with your customers.

The authors point out that many companies stay at level one for years. Some never progress past this stage. And that's ok. However, several signs will tell you when your organization needs to move up.

For instance, if you experience the same types of customer problems, issues, or complaints. Problems get resolved with one customer and crop up with another. You're losing more bids or proposals than you want to lose. Or, your customer focus results are good in one part of your business, but not so good in another.

Start by identifying what differentiates your organization from your competitors. And there are three concepts to consider here.

The first is your Points of Parity, or POPs. Your POPs are attributes or benefits you provide that are not unique to you. Your competitors are also providing them. These are more like industry standards, or the minimum requirements it takes to keep up with everyone else.

Next, look at your Points of Differentiation, or PODs. Your PODs are attributes or benefits that are consistently associated with your brand or service. Customers can't find these at most or all of your competitors.

Last, look at your Unique Value Proposition, or UVP. This is your promise or commitment to deliver a specific value that your competitors can't or don't provide.

The goal of level two is to explore, define, and leverage the UVP you deliver at every touch point in the customer interaction and relationship.

The last third of the book continues in the same vein as the first two. Here, the authors take an in-depth look at level three in the Customer Focus Maturity Model, when everyone in the organization is aligned to anticipate what customers want and can deliver it and profit from it. This last stage is the hardest to get to. But there are detailed instructions and exercises that keep guiding you towards this end goal.

So, what's our last word on "Anticipate"?

There's a lot of valuable information in this book. The authors do a good job dispelling come common myths about customer service and experience, and they explain their two frameworks clearly and in depth. We feel these provide a practical and useful way to examine your organization's customer service approach, and transition to one that focuses more on the customer experience.

Overall, in terms of helping organizations develop long-term, loyal customers, the book is a win.

The authors stress time and time again that this isn't a quick process. It's going to take years to move your organization through all three levels. Developing relationships with customers enough to learn about them, and anticipate their needs, can't be done quickly. So, don't expect any quick fixes with this book.

Our one complaint is that the book is a bit wearing to read. The authors single-mindedly stick to their objectives, focusing closely on their frameworks throughout the book, which may be one reason why the writing lacks personality. It's not quite as dry as a textbook, but you might find your mind wandering by the third or fourth chapter. There's a lot of specialized information on every page, and little relief.

But, that doesn't diminish the value. If you need to overhaul your organization's customer-service strategy we think you'll find this book to be a helpful guide.

"Anticipate," by Bill Thomas and Jeff Tobe, is published by John Wiley and Sons.

That's the end of this episode of Book Insights. Thanks for listening.