Total customer satisfaction as a business strategy

Abstract There are two fundamental goals which are universal in business. The first is to grow market share, and the second to grow profits. In order to accomplish these goals, the company must differentiate itself from its competitors, in the customer's view, in one or more of the five following areas: (1) price, (2) delivery, (3) performance, (4) quality, (5) total customer experience. Stressing one area of differentiation to the exclusion of the others will not achieve the goals. For example, in stressing price alone, a company has defined its products as a commodity and as Dev Dion of the Strategic Planning Institute once said, ‘The producers of commodities reap commensurate rewards.’ Similarly, stressing fast delivery of a product of poor quality, or stressing superior quality for a product providing marginally useful performance are both losing strategies. The only strategy I know of which provides equally balanced focus on all five major areas of differentiation is total customer satisfaction, as the fundamental objective of the company. Bob Galvin, when Chairman of Motorola, summed it up by saying, ‘If you take care of the customer better than any of your competition, the business will take care of itself.’ In saying this, however, he meant not only the product, but all of the other ways in which you and the customer interact.