Manage client expectations, grow your business

Author: Tom Aranow, Harrington Daniels Advisors

When clients or customers are disappointed, business owners and managers should be troubled. After all, the future of any growing business is dependent on making customers feel they have received fair value for their hard-earned money.

Many business owners and managers fail to understand that satisfying customers is not as simple as providing a high-quality product or service.

No matter how much you believe a customer should be satisfied with a good result, you, as an entrepreneur, professional or manager need to see that their expectations are met.

The key to your success will be their belief that they should be and are happy with the entire experience of being a customer or client.

If “expectations” drive client satisfaction, then where are the expectations created? There are a variety of sources of customer expectations that you need to manage. Consider the following:

• What expectations are fostered by your advertising and promotional material? Do they lead to expectations you might not meet?
• What expectations are promoted by your sales representatives, partners or associates in their presentations and discussions with prospective customer’s?
• What do your “image” and company reputation project in the way of quality of work? Can you live up to the image you have nurtured?
• What does your contract or schedule of services say? Is there enough detail to prevent misinterpretation and therefore a mismatch between your expectations and those of the client?
• Do you or your people take the time and initiative to confirm client expectations before the work begins? Does the customer or client get the opportunity to tell you what he expects?
• Do you routinely obtain feedback from your clients on their experience with your company? Is this feedback employed in fine-tuning your operation and improving your ability to enhance customer satisfaction?

It’s a simple fact -- the better you are at managing client expectations the more satisfied your clients will be and the more likely your business will grow and thrive.

Tom Aranow has over 30 years of executive management and entrepreneurial experience in a variety of industries and is the author of over 35 published articles and essays on best practices in business and not for profit management. He is the Senior Advisor for Business Strategies at Harrington Daniels Advisors, in Grafton, and Kohls Group Consulting in Pewaukee, he can be reached at 262-376-9507 or by email at tom@hdadvisors.com

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