Interviewing the customers of my clients is a part of nearly every project I do. I interview some customers while the client listens, and then we switch roles, and I listen to the client take a turn. We debrief after each conversation.

A nearly universal finding is this: customers speak more enthusiastically, emotionally, and positively about my clients than they speak about themselves. I would also bet my children’s college funds that the same is probably true in your case. 

This is perfectly normal and utterly inexcusable. There is an enthusiasm gap between you and your customers (they are more excited about your products and services than you are). When speaking to their colleagues, family and friends, happy customers use more drama, descriptive language, and relate more real-life value about your wares than you do. 

Your customers market your stuff better than you do. 

How to resolve this? Start talking to your customers. Daily if possible. Weekly if you must. Even monthly is better than never. Fifteen minutes per customer will do. Please don’t tell me you don’t have the time. Talking to customers will literally extract you from working in the minutia of your daily role to focus on the big-picture, real-world value you deliver to the world. You’ll think bigger, market better, and grow your company. 

You can’t afford not to do this.

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Next Week’s Webinar: Social Media Does Not Sell I’m hosting a new, live, free webinar about this topic on Wednesday March 13, at 12PM EST. I’ll dive deeper into the numbers detailed above, and discuss the damaging impact of social media on your overall marketing effort. Further, I’ll detail six marketing approaches that are proven to be more effective to increase your sales than social media. If you’ve attended my webinars, you know there’s lots of Q-and-A, and lots of interaction. There’s no cost to sign up, but space is limited (more than 200 attended each of my webinars this year) and you must register to attend.  Click here to register for this webinar.