The Importance of Cultivating Customer Relationships

Link: http://mashable.com/2013/11/25/customer-relationships/

Chapter 8 in the Valacich textbook gives us information about customer relationship management (CRM) and how it is important for businesses to attract new customers and keep existing customers happy. This article talks about the importance of cultivating customer relationships for a business. In this article, six different entrepreneurs give their intake on what they think are the best practices when building customer relationships. One of the key points that were mentioned in this article is that if you keep your current customers happy, they will more than likely refer your business to others. Another thing that was talked about was that a business should follow through with the expectations that they set for customers and to always ask “what can I do for this person?” Responding to customers promptly is also very important in building customer relationships because it shows the customers that you truly car about them and what they have to say. This was a good article that showed how important building customer relationships can be for businesses.

Questions:

1. Have you ever encountered a situation where you, as a customer, left a certain company because of poor customer relationship to a rival company? If so, what happened?

2. What do you think is the most important key to a successful business-customer relationship?

3. Have you ever been so satisfied with a business’s customer service that you have referred that business to friends or family? If so, what company was it?