Your Customer Needs

Businesses often face a rather puzzling situation wherein although they are repeatedly told that customer needs and preferences are vehemently varied and dissimilar, they find hundreds and thousands of customers going in for the same product. Take for instance Apple’s runaway success, the iPhone. Recent reports suggest that Apple plans to ship as many as 25 million units of the latest iPhone version – iPhone 4G, beginning 7June 2010, its official launch date.

Such a large number of shipments obviously suggest an equally large uptake of the offering, among customers. So, where is the so-called dissimilarity as far as customer preferences is concerned, if as many as 25 million of them are going to go in for the same product? The answer lies in the fine print; in the minor details.

In fact, the above blanketing of all 25 million customers purportedly suggesting that they all belong to the same segment is itself fallacious. It is akin to making a statement that all humans are the same since they all breathe air to survive. In the above example, if suitable survey software were to be deployed to gauge finer personality characteristics of the same 25 million potential iPhone 4G customers, it is quite likely that glaring differences would emerge between all of them.

And that is exactly the key to understanding customer differentiation as well as the pivotal role that survey software can play in identifying the same. Since customers are actually all quite different, one needs a tool that can easily identify this differentiation beneath the veil of similarity that is so easily assumed. Further, in case you are wondering as to what exactly is the big deal about identifying varied clusters of customers, the answer lies in better targeting of product offerings.

Take for instance a very broad level categorization of those who have access to the Internet and those who don’t. Now, if you run a business whose products or services are sold online only, then the second category of people who do not have access to the Internet have no relevance to your business.

That said, can we assume then that all those who do have access to the Internet, ARE potential customers for you? Obviously, NO! You would need finer details such as age group, gender, education, profession, etc. of all these people, then establish a connect between these individuals and your product or service offering, and only then come to a possible conclusion regarding their status as potential customers.

Survey software helps in all this and more; by suitably gathering relevant information about all your target customers and then categorizing them according to varied criteria, survey software gives you the leeway to send out personalized marketing or promotional messages which would perhaps be impossible otherwise. Want to contribute with your articles or feature your survey project? Click on the Contact Us link to send in your article or tell us about your SurveyMethods survey project that you’re doing.