An important type of research, and one that can really support the Relationship Review Presentations we discussed in our last Tip, is centered on understanding the customer's level of satisfaction with our company. Formal customer satisfaction surveys are terrific tools, but they don't allow for interaction and going deeper, and they can become dangerously out of date. We need direct and current feedback from people that will give it to us straight - the good and the bad.

The answers to these types of questions can help us immensely:


What are your criteria for evaluating your relationships with your suppliers?
How well are we meeting each of the criteria?
How do you feel about: our knowledge of your company; our ability to provide solutions that meet and anticipate your needs; the ease of doing business with us, the people on our team that support you, etc.?
What requirements do you have that are not being satisfied by our products, services or people?
If you could change one thing about our relationship what would you change?
Are there things that other companies are doing in their relationship with you that we would be smart to emulate?


For you hunters out there who aren't dealing with companies that are current customers (because your job is to bring in new customers), there's value in these types of questions for you, too. You can turn them in a slightly different direction and ask questions about:


The customer's degree of satisfaction with their current providers
The characteristics that they feel make a provider outstanding
What else they would like to see from current providers


The answers we get in these interviews, and the anecdotes we hear along the way, will be invaluable as we try to improve our service levels, identify new opportunities and get credit for the value we bring our customers.