I watched “You’ve Got Mail” yesterday. Ok, that sounds weird to me. In truth, it was on the TV while I meal and grocery planned for the week. When you’ve seen a movie approximately 1 zillion times, it’s the same thing. In my favorite scene (when Meg is sick) Tom says opening a store that put her small book shop out of business “wasn’t personal.” After an awesome tirade Meg says, “Whatever else anything is, it ought to begin by being personal.” Fucking A! You go with your bad self, Meg. I think everything is personal. It’s a big reason I believe developing your values is important. We are persons after all.
You are a person with a business. You have business plans. You have loads of stuff to do. There is someone else with needs and plans in this equation, the customer. Are you relating to them? Are you thinking about what they need? Are you making it personal? Have you told them about it? When you are busting your rear to get things done, it’s easy to forget to build customer relationships. The great news is that when love what you are doing and love your customer it’s easy to correct. Check out one way in my work with Pagan Pride LA/OC we have started building more of these relationships.
I am absolutely thrilled to be a member of the Pagan Pride LA/OC coordinator team. As a non-profit organization without a tangible product, they struggle to make ends meet each year. While sitting at the table discussing fundraising I got to thinking about customers. While not a traditional consumer relationship Pagan Pride surely has customers. They have several types of customers who are all interested in different products. Vendors are seeking access to customers/supporters. Presenters and performers are seeking exposure. Attendees are seeking goods, information, and entertainment. All of these things are what they seek from Pagan Pride one day of the year. So I asked myself, can we give it to them better? Is it possible for Pagan Pride to offer this year-round? Can we gain additional financial support in return?
I developed the Pagan Pride Sponsorship program as a response to these very questions. What value can we offer our customers? How can we deepen our relationships? A keystone of the sponsorship program is the monthly newsletter. It gives each member of the audience a glimpse of Pagan Pride Day once a month. Pagan Pride LA/OC also has a healthy social media network. It offers an opportunity to help vendors and presenters get their work in front of pagans who want to hear about it. The sponsorship program is a successful fledgling. I’m hopeful that as long as we keep our customers’ needs at the center of the offering, it will flourish.
- Who are your customers? be specific.
- What sort of relationship do you want to build with them?
- Expertise, friendship, levity?
- How do they talk to you?
- What language style? formal, casual, profanity?
- What channel(s)? email, in person, social media?
- When are they available?
By answering these questions and creating a relationship-building action plan you can develop stronger customer relationships and in turn a stronger business that is of service to people.