Cracking the Customer Code

Did you know that McDonald’s buys 5% of all the eggs produced in the United States?

Considering that they sell so many McMuffins, you would think that they would have listened to their customers who for years ask them to extend the hours of breakfast at their stores.

A new CEO came onboard at Mickie D’s named Steve Easterbrook. Maybe it was the association with his name (Easter and Eggs), but he made a remarkable statement to his executive team, why aren’t we listening to our customers?

With every excuse, they told him that they can’t do their mid-day meals and breakfast all day at stores. They also had a laundry list of other reasons why they just can’t make it happen. Every hurdle was logical, well-described and made perfect sense. Except it didn’t satisfy what the customer strongly wanted.

Easterbrook told them to make it happen no matter the consequences.

Results: They have finally seen comparable store sales rise at restaurants opened, at least, one year. All the flirting with wraps, salads and cappuccino couldn’t make the business start to grow again.

Why was this such a scrambled mess?

Businesses, factories, and even restaurants are organized by a plan. Needs change so quickly that without a flexible, lean approach, business can’t react to changing demand. Fashion retailer Zara is crushing it by doing just that in Spain. They are the retailer who has shortened the lead time between customer order and garments on the shelves. They found ways to eliminate everything that comes between the customer and what they want – NOW!

Questions to Crack

Are you listening to your customer’s pain point and need? Or are you finding reasons you can’t change?
If your growth is flat or sales are south, why not move out of your comfort zone and into a plan that makes you face reality.
As hard as it maybe, are you serving customers and their needs or executing a plan that is, at least, several years old?
Are you fearful that your customers will take you somewhere you don’t want to go?
Is your infrastructure built for yesterday’s needs, not today?

Marketing needs to help advocate for the customer. They are listening to social media to the conversation of their clients. Marketing is best suited to give voice inside the business. Of course, it is hard and painful to fight for what’s right. But if your marketing isn’t competing for your customer from inside the company, the business might crack. Did you know Jeff Bezos and Amazon always keeps an empty seat at every meeting to represent what’s best for the customer?

If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

__________________

Need to help to crack your customer’s code. Let’s get breakfast together. Contact me here.

Photo: Creative Commons License https://www.flickr.com/photos/stevendepolo/