The sun shines with a warm, transcendent glow as a smile spreads across your face. You are watching a group of children wrestle and jump with a contagious joy as a pink marbled sports ball sails overhead. You begin to realize that true joy is found when humans unite to form relationships that bring warmth and happiness to the world.
As our society becomes increasingly digital, and e-commerce markets take over the internet, the ability to create real human connections have become more important than ever. Every human desires to be seen, known and heard.
We are not fulfilled as human beings when we fail to recognize the importance of building strong relationships.
The Relationship Economy by John R. Dijulius outlines the importance of creating a deep connection with your customer, despite the world becoming more and more digital.
“There is one that when mastered will, without question, have the biggest impact of us personally and professionally. That skill is the ability to build an instant connection with others.” (Dijulius 2019).
In your personal and professional life, the number 1 skill that you can develop is the ability to build meaningful connections with those by whom you surround yourself with. When you put others before yourself, you become a selfless, empathetic business owner and human.
The Ability to Make Connections
You may remember a job that you finally walked into after years of meeting people and forming new colleagues. This job came about not from your own doing, but from the relationships that you spent years creating.
These relationships are a huge part of your success, and you would never be where you are now without the caring help of those around you. You need these relationships to feel fully known and fully fulfilled.
However, relationships are not easy to come by, and developing these strong relationships takes time and intentionality. Some of the main characteristics of people that can build strong relationships is that they are authentic, curious, good listener, empathetic, and they love people.
Technology is never going away; it is only going to become increasingly prevalent in every single industry. The sweet spot lies in the ability to combine digital and human experiences seamlessly.
“In a Relationship Economy the primary currency is made up of the connections and trust among customers, employees, and vendors that create a significantly more value in the what we sell. These relationships and connections help make price irrelevant” (Dijulius 2019).
Too many companies are looking for a shortcut that technology can provide without understanding how precious the currency of human relationships is. Technology can provide fast and accurate service, but it will never be able to provide the human connection that we desire.
Companies can only set themselves apart by building strong relationships within their company and community.
Adopting a mindset of service to care for customers and employees brings the personal touch that every human being craves. Employees must be trained to be empathetic and to provide world-class service to their customers. Connections result from the ability to care deeply about another person.
Real connections are the most valuable currency in within your business when the world becomes increasingly digital. We must serve employees and customers with a kind heart that transcends the modern era of technology.
Creating an Intentional Customer Experience
Do you have a business that you frequent again and again because you know that when you go there, you will be taken care of?
The majority of us purchase items or frequent specific places because we enjoy the way that we feel when we make a purchase or go to one of our favorite restaurants. We love the people that we get to interact with at our favorite coffee shop, or we make a purchase because we believe that an item will make our lives better.
The most successful business that we interact with repeatedly create systems that train employees to understand how they make the customer feel. Employees should be consistency working towards forming strong relationships inside and outside of the workplace.
One strategy to form strong relationships with customers is to gather information about a customer’s FORD (family, occupation, recreation, and dreams). Gathering this information creates a personal experience that technology could never replicate, and makes the customer feel as if they are truly cared for. In a Relationship Economy, companies need to “obsess over the customer.”
Employees and customers benefits from creating moments that become lasting memories based on the knowledge of a customers FORD.
Employees must be fully engaged to understand a customer and to provide genuine hospitality. Executing the “five Es” is a simple hospitality system that creates beneficial customer interactions. To fully engage, an employee must make eye contact, have an ear-to-ear smile, have an enthusiastic greeting, fully engage, and educate the customer.
We can always adjust our systems to accommodate any customer without having to tell them “no.” Telling a customer “no” means telling the customer that they cannot have something that they want, which can create a negative brand reputation.
“No” is a trigger that sets in motion an entire chain of negative emotions. It’s not about explaining why the customer can’t have what they want but rather focusing exclusively on what solutions are possible.” (Dijulius 2019).
Creating a customer experience that always puts the customer first requires intentionality from the whole company. Understanding how to engage customers and employees will create relationships that last a lifetime.
Becoming an Indispensable Company
There are companies across the world that have made themselves indispensable due to their incredible customer experience. Customers continue to come back again and again because they love how the company makes them feel. These are the brands that customers cannot live without.
When a company becomes a necessity, customers will pay almost any price to get the product or service that the company provides. In order to become this, your company must care about a customer more than any other company.
“Being a trusted advisor means demonstrating that no one cares about your customer’s business like you do. You earn business by being generous with your knowledge and resources without asking for anything in return” (Dijulius 2019).
The customer is always the hero of the story.
Building long-term relationships creates “social capital” as your network of personal and professional resources expands. Having social capital means that the other person’s dreams and goals take precedence in every single relationship. Building these strong relationships can allow a company to make price irrelevant and avoid paying the “average tax.”
Making sure that customers and employees cannot live without your company means that you will gain respect from both the giver and receiver. Strong relationships give you the power to create a company that cares about people more than just the product or service.
We must be present with each other to understand how one another is affected by our actions. The same is true in the business world when building trust with employees and customers.
The success of a company depends on the care that the employees have for the customers. Relationships are beautifully and intentionally built over time. Trust comes from positive actions repeated again and again.
Ultimately, nothing can be done alone; we are relational creatures that need to be around other human beings. Technology can never replace the meaning of being with people who care about us. To succeed in anything means to succeed in building deep, intentional relationships.
References
DiJulius, J. R. (2019). The relationship economy: Building strong customer connections in the digital age. Greenleaf Book Group Press.