According to Jeff Bezos, the customer is the most important thing for businesses and organizations to obsessively focus on. If you do that, then you become one step closer to success. A customer-centric strategy, however, is only possible with diversity. Discover why diversity is a must for a customer-centric company and how you can implement it within your organization.
What is Custome-Centricity?
Customers are the primary beneficiary of the value stream developed by a business or organization. Customer-centricity, on the other hand, is a mindset adopted by the organization with a focus on fostering a positive experience for the customers. This is made possible by providing usable solutions in the form of products or services that improve the value of the customers’ lives.
Organizations need to aim for a customer-centric mindset because it is directly related to the ability to generate profits. If you can keep customers happy, they will choose your business over others. A customer-centric approach in doing business also increases employee engagement and delivers higher customer satisfaction.
Another advantage of a customer-centric approach is the ability to enjoy increased sustainability and better alignment of your long-term goals. This is made possible because you have deep empathy and an understanding of customer needs.
What is an Example of a Diverse Team?
According to experts, diversity is a crucial element to business success. It is also an important piece of the puzzle as you strive to build a customer-centric approach to doing business. But first, you need to understand what diversity is and what a diverse team looks like.
A diverse team is one that consists of individuals with different backgrounds. There are hundreds of varieties when it comes to teams that exemplify diversity and inclusion. Here are some examples of a diverse team if you want to implement them for your own organization.
- A team that is made up of individuals from various cultures. This includes a multinational team that works together to bring in different skill sets, world views, and cultural experiences. They use their varying backgrounds and cultural knowledge to form a more efficient way to solve problems and to look at every situation from a different angle. This does not just refer to a team consisting of individuals of varying nationalities; it can also be made up of individuals from various ethnicities too.
- A team that puts emphasis on selecting members that come from different backgrounds or including those from the minority groups. For example, this could mean that an organization provides leadership roles to qualified candidates regardless of gender, age, race, or sexual orientation.
- A diverse team or organization is not just limited to the members of your team per se. It could also mean providing equal opportunities to suppliers or vendors that support your business. For example, you could choose to give opportunities to vendors or trade organizations from the underrepresented parts of the society.
- Lastly, you can also form a diverse team by hiring remotely and including individuals from various locations (in your country or in other parts of the world as well). It is now possible with the remote work setup for companies to hire individuals from different parts of the world. They can bring their values and experiences to put together a more diverse team.
These are just some examples of how you can incorporate diversity into your team or organization. In the next section, discover how diverse life experience, skills, and culture can benefit your commitment to fostering customer-centricity in your organization.
Benefits of Diversity for Customer-Centric Strategy
A lot of so-called marketing professionals have the idea that being customer-centric is a given for any business organization. But closer inspection reveals otherwise. There are lots of businesses that are inundated with customer complaints due to poor customer service. This is a testament that customer-centricity is not at the core of these businesses.
This is where diversity comes into play. Building a diverse group of people to make up your team is a core ingredient of a customer-centric strategy. The goal is to make your employee base a representative of the customers you are trying to represent. It not only helps you understand who your customers are, but also allows you to connect with them on a deeper level.
To put this into perspective, here are some of the actionable insights that you can use to improve how you deliver customer experience by building a diverse team.
1. Diversity helps focus on the customer
Diversity in the organization enables you to identify the different segments of your target market. While you have a specific target market, there can be sub-segments that you can focus on more closely to deliver a more targeted, specific approach that enhances user satisfaction. This approach to a customer-centric strategy is what brings higher value to your customers.
2. Diversity helps to better understand the customer needs
A culture of diversity in your organization also opens your eyes to the differences among every individual that you are serving. In doing so, you develop a higher capacity to listen and understand your customer needs such that you develop features that address them.
3. Diversity helps us to think and feel like the customer
A diverse team is also important because it enables you to see things from a different perspective. The different life experiences and viewpoints can give you a better grasp of how your customers might think or feel about your products and services, allowing you to adjust how you deliver it to them accordingly.
4. Diversity helps us build whole product solutions
A diverse team is also committed to providing a complete solution for your intended users for the products and services you have to offer. The objective is to ensure a positive initial and long-term experience for them, especially as their needs evolve over time.
5. Diversity helps us to know the customer lifetime value
Working with a diverse team helps you to nurture and foster a long-term relationship with your customers. You are not satisfied with the transactional mentality but rather aspire to offer as much value to the customer journey as possible.
Diversity is an important ingredient to a customer-centric organization. However, this is not a be-all-end-all approach to providing a positive customer experience. Just like any other business tool, your success lies in how you use this tool to maximize its potential.
