Shownotes…
There are usually more “customers” in the B2B relationship than in B2C. Typically, there will be, among others, …
- Decision maker
- User
- Billing / Accounts Payable
- Shipping & Receiving
It’s important to remember not all “customers” interact with each other to fully understand the overall experience they are having with a vendor.
As a vendor, you MUST understand that each customer has different needs.
Responsiveness is critical. ANY downtime is typically a loss of revenue for the B2B customer.
Accenture states the new focus for B2B companies should not be territory coverage or sales volumes, but on co-creating value by delivering exceptional customer experiences.
All channels involved in the vendor organization need to have a cohesive understanding of the desired CX and know what they MUST do and what they CAN do to ensure that.
What they must do… bare minimum expectations.
What they CAN do… how each channel is empowered to save the relationship
A KEY element – communication between ALL channels.
Sales reps make the promises to the decision maker and the rest of the silos fulfill those promises quite often to an entirely different set of customers.
In B2B it’s usually advantageous to have an “Account Manager” or Team for certain large accounts or account groupings to keep the key players in sales, service, and distribution up to date and on the same page to serve the client in a proactive manner and able to quickly react and respond cohesively when necessary.
As with any customer relationship, customer loyalty is always the end goal of the B2B business.