13Value and Relationship versus Products and Services
As part of nearly every revenue growth project that I do with clients, I speak to their customers. I've done thousands of these customer interviews over the past decade or so. As I'll detail in the next part of this book, I ask the customers what they like best about working with my clients. They talk to me about things like reliability, dependability, how my client saves them time, helps them make money, and helps them sleep at night. What they do not talk about at all are the products and services! Or the problems! Or the price!
We love to talk about the products and services. We detail them, we present them, we discuss the specifications, we talk about the installation, or the implementation. We stay focused on the stuff.
But the customer doesn't think about your products and services when they think about you. They think about the value of buying those products and services from YOU.
The products and services are a commodity.
The products and services are boring! Your stuff is not exciting.
Buying it from you—that's what excites the customer.
It's your relationship that keeps them coming back.
Yes, the products are important.
But as one customer told me recently in an interview for a client: “We buy the product, but we go to them for the relationship. It's the friendship that keeps us coming back.”
They can buy it anywhere, and they know it. They often tell me this.
They can buy it cheaper than they do from you, elsewhere, ...
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