A recent article in the McKinsey Quarterly highlights the gap between the messages that suppliers are offering to their business customers and what these customers really want to know. It seems that some businesses don’t really understand what messages their B2B customers value most!
The main thrust of the article is that the main messages that suppliers promote are not always those that influence customer perceptions and buying decisions. The research examined a number of messages promoted by Fortune 500 and DAX 30 companies and surveyed over 700 executives to find out which of these messages affected brand perceptions. The results were very interesting: “Two of the most important themes for customer perceptions of brand strength—effective supply chain management and specialist market knowledge—were among those least mentioned by B2B suppliers.”
So why the discrepancy? Is it because listening to customers is not perceived to be as important in the B2B sector? Perhaps.
For years we have advocated that understanding customers is as important in the B2B sector as in the B2C sector. Although some of our clients start by engaging in B2C Voice of Customer programmes, they often expand the programme to their B2B divisions once the benefits become visible.
Origin Energy, one of Australia’s largest energy companies, recently rolled-out the Feedback Ferret solution to better understand its business customers. Since 2010, Origin had seen how effective Feedback Ferret was in helping them understand consumer feedback comments and have now implemented the tool to analyse web surveys from their business customers. Origin is actively trying to understand what make their business customers tick and is responding to their feedback accordingly. They have realised how important it is to understand ALL their customers.
If you are in the B2B sector, do you really understand your customers? Do the messages you portray match the messages and values of your customers?