I couldn’t see the forest for the trees with my stepdaughter.
I’ve known her since she was six years old (she’s now in her early 20s) and, since she’s had some health problems, my husband and I have been remodeling our basement into an independent apartment for her.
I figured she’d be excited to have her own place. Freedom, independence, privacy, at last!
Boy, was I wrong.
She is excited – just not for the reasons I thought.
Here’s what she texted me the other day …
“I’m looking forward to finally having an official home and not moving back and forth.”
And with that one sentence, I realized that – even though I know and love her – I had missed the whole point.
See, my husband and his ex-wife had joint custody. Which meant my stepdaughter spent her entire childhood moving from one house to the other every few days.
She had two good homes – but it was exhausting for her.
I knew that, yet I hadn’t thought about it. I totally missed it as the reason for her excitement about the new place to live.
If I had been in charge of designing a marketing campaign and she was my ideal customer, I’d have missed the mark.
It was only after hearing her own words about what was important to her that I fully understood her perspective.
That’s the power of voice-of-customer research. You may know a lot about your customer but that is not the same as hearing from them directly.
When I do voice-of-customer research for my clients, I use tools such as surveys and interviews to uncover what is important to their customers. And then I revamp their marketing to reflect what has been learned.
Voice-of-customer ensures that you are leading with what is most important to your customers.
If you would like to learn more about voice-of-customer research, check out my new white paper, Great to Hear Your Voice.
Photo by Nathan Bingle on Unsplash