Creating the correct customer-centric business model is your ticket to standing out from your competitors and encouraging customer loyalty.

Customer-centricity is essential for companies since it drives a customer further down the sales funnel. According to research done by Forbes, companies who have customer-centricity in their marketing strategies profit 60% more than those who don’t.

To become customer-centric, it’s important you first understand the core needs and wants of your potential buyers. For example, you find out which channels your customers engage with the most, what they might purchase, and more. However, to succeed in doing this, you have to know the buyer’s journey initially.

At the same time, it isn’t easy to please everyone, and it’s well-known that not every customer has the exact same wants and needs. However, creating strategies and segmenting groups of customers is essential.

in this article, we will look at some great examples that include successful customer-centric companies.

6 examples include successful customer-centric companies

1. Happy Scribe: Lightning-fast in audio translation services

Happy Scribe provides audio translator software that is easy to use and lightning fast with high levels of accuracy. The way you can translate from one language to another is beneficial for customers since they can do it quickly within a short period of time. Moreover, it allows them to learn a new language.

Most translations will take up a tremendous amount of time from customers, and maybe they might be in a rush; however, Happy Scribe does an impressive job in saving clients time but translating from one language to another in only a few minutes.

Furthermore, clients need to upload their audio files supported in more than 120 languages, accents, and dialects. Before the audio is translated, it initially needs to be transcribed. After that, it may either be human-made, which adds up to 99% accuracy, or machine-generated, which has an accuracy of 85%. Afterwards, the translation will be completed within a minute.

This example shows the efficiency of translation services Happy Scribe offers. Moreover, if you visit their website, you’ll see that their review rate scores a near-perfect 5-star rating and is trusted by more than 100 large companies worldwide.

2. Starbucks: efficiency in product feedback and loyalty

Fulfilling customer needs and product feedback is an essential follow-up for Starbucks. By building itself on customer needs and evaluating product feedback, Starbucks has adapted its marketing strategy and operations to enhance its efficiency. However, it might be challenging to accomplish this since they provide many customization options regarding their products that consumers have enjoyed in the past years.

Starbucks has increased efficiency without sacrificing product quality with its loyalty program. The loyalty program offers in-store pickups and membership discounts that encourage visitors to come again. In addition, via the app, members are allowed to access an excellent level of customization options available in-store, even having chances to pick up a drink from Starbucks at a scheduled time.

Even though many customers are enjoying these fast services, customers who have more time may not experience the same thing at Starbucks.

Starbucks took advantage of its loyalty program to fulfill customers’ needs that are rushing, and this approach has paid off for Starbucks.

Starbucks became a popular app in many restaurants worldwide and achieved 20 million users, being the #1 company in customer loyalty.

3. McDonald’s: effective in customer satisfaction

Mcdonald’s has always been excellent at delivering suburb services and an outstanding customer experience, leading it to be customer-centric at all times.

Mcdonald’s has dramatically influenced all cities it operates in to create a high customer-centric experience. For instance, the “Happy meal” is an excellent example of the superb customer experience it offers.

Moreover, to be fully customer-centric, Mcdonald’s started analyzing data in-depth and gained further insights regarding customer needs and the issues associated with its products and services. After all, if you don’t know about your customers, you’ll have difficulty understanding their pain points.

Mcdonald’s is successful in collecting data since it has used various channels such as social media platforms, customer survey forms, figuring out customers’ pain points, and more.

Furthermore, they figured out what most people want in their all-day menu, including breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So, this is what Mcdonald’s did:

• Introduced new health foods, including egg whites, oatmeals, fruit & maple, and more
• Offering side options in customer’s breakfast meals such as hash browns and egg McMuffins

After Mcdonald’s successfully introduced an all-day breakfast menu, it saw some all-time highs in its revenue. The first time this occurred was in 2016, and it exceeded its financial predictions.

4. Wayfair: Uses AI for data personalization

Wayfair offers over eight million products from the furniture and decor industry. There are more than 70,000 options to choose from, and Wayfair has incorporated AI to ensure it carries out a customer-centric approach, improving the user experience and reducing time consumption.

Wayfair uses predictive analysis and AI to ensure an in-detail buyer persona is created, so customers can save time by eliminating the need to scroll through many pages and products to find what they need or prefer. Machine learning capabilities are used for this to be possible. The customer-centric strategy here with Wayfair is that they are seeking to save customers time.

5. Patagonia: builds transparency

Patagonia is fully committed to environmental goals for the upcoming decades and has enhanced its marketing efforts for the environment. According to a study by Forbes, Gen Z is considered the “sustainable generation,” meaning they are more focused on a greener economy and world.

Patagonia solves a huge issue since it doesn’t only focus on sustainable efforts, but puts transparency as a top priority, and provides wealthy information regarding product development and process to its customers. Moreover, Patagonia has been more willing to answer questions regarding products and services, being honest about any issues concerning their quality. The company’s honesty to its customers shows how trustworthy they can be and how customer-centric they are.

Comparatively, Patagonia finds trust with customers essential to their business’s success and finds new ways to appreciate their services. From time to time, they create repair guides, fix products, and re-use existing materials to purchase a new one. For instance, Patagonia launched a new program called the “worn wear college tour,” where they would fix all clothes bought to them by university students. Although, to be honest, it doesn’t favor Patagonia financially; however, it does enhance customer satisfaction and brings a broader image to how much they care about customers.

6. Amazon’s personalization level

Recommendations are what drive Amazon sales. According to a study by Bigdata, Amazon’s personalized recommendations are what make nearly half of their total sales! All of these recommendations come from Amazon scanning your buying history, items you have added or even abandoned in your cart, and items you have recently viewed. Or sometimes, even, there are items other customers have purchased, Amazon will recommend similar products. Moreover, these personalized recommendations are what makes Amazon so customer-centric and successful.

Personalization helps attract new customers and transform them into long-term ones. Research shows that personalizations have immensely influenced a company’s revenue rate by 10% to 15%! Moreover, shoppers who have personalization within a company are most likely to return to a site since not every organization provides these kinds of services on the scale that Amazon does.

Wat can we learn from Amazon?

Amazon has achieved more revenue only from learning more about its customers and is undoubtedly one of the most significant global retail leaders with various options to choose from. As a result, Amazon has built a high trust rate between them and their customers. It’s now time you take the necessary steps to do the same.

Wrapping it up

These are our top examples of deeply customer-centric companies and have hit record high numbers from their success rates. Of course, what is most important is for a company to focus on their customers, but many fail to do so, which is where they fail to increase their revenue rates.

Take into account what your business can offer to your customers and in which way you differ from your competitors. If you carefully read through each customer-centric example we provided you with, you’ll notice that each company had something unique that the other companies didn’t have. After all, that’s what makes a company successful, providing something unique and something more than the rest.

Figure out what you can do and what your business stands for. Even if you offer something that won’t immensely benefit you at the beginning financially, if it increases customer loyalty, then, don’t think twice about incorporating it in your strategy to be customer-centric!

A company that values its customer’s business may set up a designated customer support team for complaints and feedback, but a customer centric company will put the needs of customers at the forefront of operations and ensure that all members of the team are on the same page.

By re-evaluating the role of all team members in regard to customer service, it is possible to completely change the relationship that your brand has with its customer base and to achieve greater results in customers satisfaction and sales.

It may sound like a massive upheaval to completely change the way that a company deals with its clients – one of those “if it ain’t broke” moments – but some simple changes in the approaches of staff and the presentation of policies can make a big difference. The following points are all important questions to ask yourself about your own company’s approach to customer service.

1) What is your brand philosophy and is it clear to customers and staff?

All companies have an ethos, a simple philosophy that they want to express to their customers and employees about the way they do business. In a customer centric team, the focus has to be on clear, concise values, ideally ones that involve putting customers and their needs first. The shorter the slogan, the easier it is to reinforce to employees through visual cues and repetition.

The same goes for a list of vital policies. Create a simple list that can be reinforced on a regular basis through meetings and make sure that staff can memorize it well enough to repeat it back to the client. You don’t need to drill it into them like an army officer, but it should be reinforced.

2) Are you providing the optimal level of customer interaction?

This is the primary focus of most customer-focused services – companies need to be able to listen to their customers and deal with complaints in an effective manner. Sending out a great message through these slogans along with clever branding is a great start, but companies also need to be able to listen to feedback and amend policies where necessary.

The first approach here is to use a strong customer centric team of support staff that can deal with calls and complaints and take surveys to determine customer satisfaction. Live chats with online advisers and support tickets on websites are the best way to deal with customers one-on-one for a meaningful conversation, but responsibilities have to go beyond the front line of customer service advisers.

It is also important to listen to what the customer is not saying. How many times have we experienced poor service and when asked “How was your experience?” (meal, shopping or any other experience) said “fine” or “good” knowing that complaining will not help or there just isn’t enough time in the schedule to complain. By giving a one-word response, you can bet the customer experience failed. Rest assured, a one-word response is a customer complaint.

3) Are you making sure that everyone is involved?

It used to be enough to let the customer service department deal with any personal interactions and complaints, but this approach can cause a divide in the company where staff members are no longer on the same page. If tech staff, management and customer complaint handlers all have the same information, they can all make informed customer service decisions that really help consumers – instead of passing the buck by saying “this has nothing to do with my department.”

Also, if high-level employees have to take customer support tickets once in a while, they can better appreciate the work of their staff and perhaps make the process easier if they find a fault with the system.

4) Are you empowering your employees?

Getting employees of all levels involved with a customer centric team is just the start. These employees – whether high-level management or low-level customer service staff – need to feel as though they have the power to deal with customer complaints in order to make positive changes.

Too often a customer can feel as though they are not being listened to on a personal level because customer service employees freeze up at that crucial moment. They are too used to following strict policies and are unable deviate from the script – an approach that can lead to poor results and a potential loss of business. The best alternative is to give employees room to breathe and to make personal judgement calls that are based on that particular situation.

5) Do your staff members have enough accountability?

This level of empowerment and control over customer interactions can make a big difference in the overall result of the phone call or query as it gives the employee greater ownership of both the situation and the client. Providing staff with a personal stake in the outcome drives them to succeed and to implement all those mantras and customer-focused codes that have become such an important part of the company ethos.

It also gives them accountability for the results of that customer interaction, which should offer that extra incentive to provide great service. All accountable employees want to be seen to be doing their best and in a customer-facing role, and this means providing the very best service until a personal problem is resolved.

6) Are your staff members rewarded for their customer service?

There is one last tool for creating a customer centric team that should not be overlooked and that is the employee reward program. It is easy to think that by focusing on customers and customer service, employee satisfaction takes a bit of a back seat, but under appreciating staff members can be dangerous.

By highlighting a particularly impressive customer service call or singling out a staff member with a great customer satisfaction record for the month, businesses can show employees that customer centric work doesn’t go unrewarded.This will provide that final incentive for employees to continue their good work. It doesn’t have to be a bottle of champagne, a simple certificate or social media mention will do.

7) Building a customer centric team is as much about the employees and their role within the business as it is about the customer.

When building a business on customer service and customer-friendly values, it is natural to take the approach of “the customer is always right” while forgetting about the needs of employees. Building communication between staff and customers is vital. Ensure that your philosophy is clear and make sure that all employees have some customer-facing experience. Remember to empower staff and make them accountable. Finally, reward and celebrate their successes.

About the Author

Ronald E. Foster is a results-focused executive leader with extensive experience driving sales, margin growth, and overall profitability by leveraging customer service and support as a core profit center. Highly skilled at creating market differentiation and building value through the development of dynamic, customer centric service organizations, Ronald is a long-term, strategic visionary with a proven record of improving bottom line returns by continually improving upon customer success and the total customer experience.

Many organizations are undertaking efforts to better understand consumer activity as a way to onboard new customers and generate second sell opportunities.

Irrespective of the market that you play in, understanding what the customer expects and how you perform in meeting or exceeding those expectations can serve as a market differentiator in situations where you can close the gap.

While all of us would like to think that we have the best products and services to offer within our respective industry the reality is that it doesn’t really matter what we think if existing and prospective customers think otherwise.

In an effort to address some systemic service issues for a former employer in the insurance industry, I was asked to spend 3 months onsite at a major financial institution to address breakdowns in claims and service calls inbound to the insurer.

I met hundreds of employees in group and one-on-one sessions and often found that there were many disconnects between what we thought the customer needed and what they truly wanted. In essence, all too often companies assume they know what’s in the best interest of their customers, an assumption that can sometimes have adverse consequences. I decided to conduct a random survey and held a set of interviews with individuals in preparation for a future assignment. One interview was so compelling; I thought it would be worthwhile to share that discussion as a way to demonstrate the importance of understanding the customer experience.

The individual that I interviewed was “Margaret”, an active 81 year old woman who had a rewarding executive career with a major retailer in New York. She is someone who knows a thing or two about service and was a believer in retirement savings and insurance protection. She also stood out because of her prowess with social media and her embrace of all things web based. Read excerpts from the interview below, I think you might find the discussion relevant to customer initiatives that may be underway in your organization.

Gary: “Margaret, thanks for agreeing to this interview and allowing me to capture your thoughts around customer service. There are no limits around industry or products so I’d like you to simply jump in and share your thoughts and perspectives on the state of affairs as you see it when comes to customer service.”

Margaret: “Well, you may regret asking me for my thoughts. When I think of customer service, I think of words like aid, support, resolve, assist, focus, etc. Words that don’t seem to apply in today’s arena.”

Gary: “Why do you feel that these things don’t apply today?”

Margaret: ” It seems like companies today simply want to offer you half of a product and then ask you to spend the other half of your time doing what they should be doing. I assume that it has a lot to do with expenses and less resources but if I am buying a product then I should not have to go to a website and read a manual or call and get lost on pre recorded messaging if I need help.”

Gary: “Can you give me a specific example?”

Margaret: “Sure, last week I switched internet service providers and had trouble establishing a connection, so all of the “help” manuals on what to do online were useless. When I called for assistance I spent 10 minutes bouncing around the maze of messaging looking for a way to connect to a “live” individual. I made that call three times over the course of at least a half hour because I guessed at the problem, selected the option, received an answer and the call terminated. That’s not customer service.”

Gary: “How did you resolve the situation?”

Margaret: “I called a family member with internet access who did some research and found documentation online on how to fix the problem. The service tech had the modem on the wrong setting. That’s just one example Gary, there are many more, it just seems like once the purchase is made, no one cares after that. Not necessarily a bad thing if your product never breaks and no one has any questions.”

Gary: “I know I said that you could talk about any industry but let’s make this question more specific to Financial Services. I think it’s absolutely impressive the way you were able to raise your family after the loss of your husband—and be in a position to thrive financially after being retired for twenty plus years. Did you hit the lottery?”

Margaret: “No, I didn’t hit the lottery but I met an Insurance agent many years ago who sat in our home and talked about risks and savings and income and asset protection and he answered a lot of questions, never asked for a dime, which might have been the actual premium for one of the policies back then [laugh]. He made me, no he made us feel like we mattered and that was ultimately the reason why we purchased life insurance policies and eventually other financial products from that agent.”

Gary: “Interesting, you said that you purchased the products from the agent, not the company. Why?”

Margaret: “People make the company not the other way around. We trusted him and he was responsive to our questions and concerns right up until the day he retired. No phone call went unreturned and he acted in our best interest. Last month I had a question about an IRA and when I called for an answer, I actually got one even without all of my identifying information and the person made sure I had no other questions before hanging up. They were less robotic and more personable on the phone. I like this company and most of my investments remain with them.”

Gary: “As someone who has worked in the service industry why do you think service has deteriorated over the years?”

Margaret: “Well, part of me wants to say outsourcing but I think the reality is that companies are over relying on the customer to help impact their expense goals. Push as much as possible out to the customer, make them conform to your processes, charge them more for automation and limit contact once purchases are made. That seems to be the blueprint these days. Hey, if you need me to dust off the work clothes, I might be willing to come back and help you guys fix this stuff?”

Gary: “Margaret, I just may take you up on that offer. Thank you for your insights and feedback.”

As companies seek to better understand the relationships they have with existing customers, the real challenge is not in how quick you pick up inbound calls, or how fast you hang up the phone that will determine your success because those measurements are about a company’s internal satisfaction with execution. The real focus, the challenge that you must solve for, the decision that you will have to make is ultimately whether customer centricity is an investment that promotes doing more rather than less for your customers.

About the Author

Gary Garris has spent twenty plus years working in the insurance and financial services arena and leading voice of the customer and sales initiatives. He has a well rounded operational background in underwriting, sales, auditing, claims and application development.

Don’t these same companies intend to do their best by supplying good products, installing toll-free numbers, and generally fixing problems that customers complain about?

So what’s the problem?

I contend that companies generally do not pro-actively think about the customer. Ask yourself how easy is it for your customers to do business with you?

Better yet, ask your customer.

Organizations don’t begin to think about customer service until a customer complains. And the truth is most customers don’t complain they vote with their feet by going elsewhere. What I call their silent vote.

You might be surprised to find that:

64% of customers feel companies with which they frequently interface by telephone are not respectful of their time.

70% of customers will change suppliers due to poor service – today’s competitive environment makes this choice easier.

It takes between 2-4 times the cost to find a new customer as to retain a customer.

Reducing these customer defections by 5% could increase profits, as much as 50%.

It seems clear where I would spend my time if I were the senior management of any organization. I would aggressively develop a passionate attitude throughout my organization to ensure every experience that every customer has is more than they expect – in other words seek Customer Delight in everything we do.

Believe it or not, most organization don’t know how to start, let alone, deploy an effective customer oriented attitude and support system.

It’s more than one or two individuals trying their best. Or the latest piece of technology. It’s starts with the CEO. His or her deeds, and action towards the customer represent the standard.

The CEO must believe that always doing the best for each customer will contribute significantly towards increasing the financial health of the company.

Let me provide a simple, but powerful customer service example.

When I was a young salesman visiting Bob Collins, CEO of GE Fanuc, he was made aware of some poorly manufactured product.

It was an honest mistake by the manufacturing group. Not all products were impacted, but Bob immediately halted all shipments and instructed his people to pull everything back out of inventory and retest it before shipment.

This all seemed to be the prudent thing to do. However, his people told him that they couldn’t retest everything and still make shipments for the month.

Further, they would surely miss their quarterly, and perhaps yearly shipment goals.

Bob clearly understood his decision would negatively impact his financial results. In fact, revenue goals, employee bonuses, and profit would be affected. To me it seemed like a tough decision, but Bob made his decision without hesitation. He would retest everything. In a blink of an eye, people moved to implement his customer-oriented choice.

When I quizzed Bob on how fast he made this decision, he said, “My customers best interests always comes first”. “If I serve their interests, they will reward me time and again with their business”, he added. It may seem trite, but Bob meant it and more importantly, his organization knew he meant it. I believe this was part of Bob’s CEO makeup and helped propel GE Fanuc to consistent double-digit growth with above industry profit returns.

So what’s the message?

Understanding your customer and driving that customer orientation into every aspect of your organization pays dividends time and again. Successful organizations know that it’s everyone’s job to work for the customer. It doesn’t matter if they are a first year accountant or a long-time maintenance person; each has a part in driving your organization to provide exceptional customer service.

Now the hard part. Moving your company to a level that routinely provides Customer Delight is a never-ending and on-going process, not an event. How often have your heard someone in your organization suggest that they could get more work done if they didn’t get interrupted with telephone calls from customers. Or someone in order entry exclaims, ” What a jerk that guys is, doesn’t he understand we’re doing our best”. Get radical. In both cases I would fire the person or the individual responsible for training and supervising that area.

My final advice is to begin today. As Bob Collins would say, “Your customers will reward you time and again with their business”.

About the Author

With many post graduate courses in management, leadership, marketing and technology to his credit, Frank Williams is a widely respected marketer, speaker, author and technologist. He has significant knowledge in marketing strategies and is the founder and CEO of Global Marketing, Inc. – a leader in business, marketing and sales consulting.