A technical sales company is often run by someone who knows the product but doesn’t enjoy being the public face of the company. Staying within one’s lonely comfort zone can cause a leader to miss signals that frustrated customers are ready to switch from no-bid renewals to a competitive bidding process. In this case study, a single source provider did not have the perspective to deduce the scope and nature of the issues that were putting their most important relationship at risk.
This is one of a series of case studies highlighting “Key Questions and Course Correction Quotes” taken from 20 years of B2B customer insight projects. All the names are fictitious, but the situations are real. The case studies paint a picture of how important it is to know what your B2B customers think, but not what they say. These are real-world examples of how soliciting and acting on customer feedback has helped companies retain customers longer, grow relationships, and win new business faster.
Case Study: Relationship in Danger
Key question (asked to a multi-million dollar account COO): “You don’t have a day-to-day relationship with ‘PartsCo,’ so it’s hard for them to be sure what your expectations are. What should they understand about what do you personally expect of them now and how might it be different than what you expected of them earlier in the relationship?
Course Correction Quote:
COO: “It’s hard to negotiate with them. We don’t want to be ripped off, and in some cases we feel ripped off. By comparison, our other key suppliers are more flexible. We are also concerned about their quality control and their willingness to replace faulty parts. I wasn’t here when the relationship was new. I met his #2 guy, but I’ve only seen his top exec at industry conferences. He needs to show me between contract negotiations that he thinks our business is important. I want to continue to renew them , and recent improvements in quality control are helping, but you have to recognize that we have options.”
Client Hours:
This great multi-year relationship had started quite successfully, but slowly deteriorated over time. PartsCo felt helpless as their main partnership seemed to be disappearing. They were desperate to understand what they were doing wrong and how they could get things back on track.
Conclution:
The real problem was that most of the communication in recent years had been done at the front-line level, except during contract negotiations. Much had changed at the upper levels of the customer over time, and PartsCo stayed on the sidelines. PartsCo’s leadership needed to regularly initiate top-down peer communication and stay engaged. Its top executive had a technical background. He needed advice on how to structure a conversation to maintain a relationship. Once he understood the fundamental nature of the problem, he and his team quickly began listening more closely and working more collaboratively with this client (and others). The relationship is now back to normal.
I classify projects as assessments, investigations, treasure hunts, or rescue missions. This project was a “rescue mission”. The challenge was, “Can this marriage be saved?”