Customer-related goal
Whereas the net profit goal speaks to the financial health of the company in the near term, your customers determine your health in the longer term. It is very possible, and continually demonstrated by companies no longer around, that a company could generate strong profits this year while also alienating its customers, thus killing the Golden Goose.
Consequently, you might consider some type of survey to determine what your customers think about your company. Ultimately, you’d like to know if they’ll buy from you at all, if they’ll continue to buy from you, and what you have to do to ensure that they do.
Unfortunately, we don’t know of the perfect survey for every company. After all, there are great differences in the nature of the work, the characteristics of the customers, the make-up of the staff, and so forth.
We’ve seen surveys that include virtually dozens of questions, from the way the receptionist treats the walk-in customer to the way that the bill is handled by the accounting department. All of these surveys are designed, in some way, to collect information that the company believes is somehow helpful.
Our guidance here is two-fold. First, try to make the survey as short as possible. Focus on the things that are of paramount importance, and ignore low-value questions. Most folks simply don’t enjoy filling out long questionnaires, or any questionnaires. Second, try to formulate overarching questions—questions that include numerous other topics.
For example, there is a popular movement now to use only a single question in a customer survey. The question is, “How strongly would you recommend us to a friend?”
The logic here is that the customers’ recommendations are of paramount importance. If the customer would recommend you, even though the receptionist may have been a little curt, you must be doing the important things right.
What we know here is that we like questions like this. It is overarching in its nature and focuses directly on what the customer thinks about your company.