In our last Tip of the Month, we introduced the term V.O.C.C., or "Voice of the Customer's Customer", to highlight another way of looking at research. The idea is that, as we do our research, we can gain valuable insights by talking to the customers of the companies we are researching. As consumers, many of us are doing this already. We often check Airbnb or Yelp reviews before booking a vacation hotel or dinner at a new restaurant in order to see what customers are saying about them. The things we learn from these customers can help shape our decisions.

In sales and relationship management roles, the things we learn from our customer's customer can help shape our sales message. In our roles, we are often selling our solutions to individual departments, such as IT, Operations, Finance and Marketing. Most of these departments have internal customers, and we can extend our research by talking to these customers. Here are a few examples:

To someone in sales leadership (when you are selling to Marketing)


"How would you describe your relationship with Marketing?"
"What is Marketing doing to support your new business development goals?"
"How do you feel about your pipeline of leads?"


To someone in Manufacturing (when you are selling to Procurement)


"How closely do you work with Procurement in managing your supply of raw materials?"
"How would you describe your relationship with them?
"What are they doing to support your 'just in time' initiatives?"


As a client recently told us, "You can't be a Business Resource to a company unless you understand their customer base." That goes for departments as well as companies.


V.O.C.C. - the next level of our research.