Questions help shed light on a situation and uncover underlying assumptions. If you ask the right questions, it can put in motion the initial stirrings for you and your team to see things differently and dream of new possibilities. As many organisations are looking to be more customer-focused, here are a few questions to spark your thinking:

Question: How do you respond to your customer needs?

Purpose: This targets your organisation’s operational effectiveness. It is not only important to have deep knowledge about your customer, but what are you doing to proactively make the customer’s experience seamless i.e. how frictionless are your interactions, how flexible are you, how quick and precise is your execution. Consider how you can minimise the effort required by your customer to complete a task when engaging in a transaction with you.

Question: In what ways are you curating your services to satisfy your customer needs?

Purpose: This question explores how predictive or personalised you are. Once you know your customer needs, you need to convert this insight into ways to service them and provide recommendations so that they can make easier choices.

Question: In what ways can you deliver new and surprising value?

Purpose: This question opens up possibilities for new products, services, value propositions and even business models. When you are ‘armoured’ with a deep understanding of your customer and what is important to them, you can add value in ways that will help you differentiate from the competition and even disrupt the marketplace.

Question: What areas can be automated and digitalised – and are these areas already automated and digitalised?

Purpose: Apart from the savings associated with automating processes, this question forces you to think about how continuously connected you are with your customer. With the rise of the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence, there is a multitude of technological and digital solutions available. Which solution will help you satisfy your customer needs without being asked? Which solution will help you build and nurture a trusting relationship with your customer?

Question: Does your customer trust you?

Purpose: This is the most important question and I have saved it for last. Trust underpins every customer initiative that you implement. Without trust, your effort to be more customer-centric will fall short and people will see you as paying lip service.

So, now that I’ve got you thinking, let me ask you two final powerful questions…How are you keeping connected with your customers, and what are you doing to turn this to your advantage?