Customer Loyalty is All that Matters

Loyalty is a very interesting concept. We all say we are “loyal” to something, but when I ask people to explain what loyalty is to them – or what they are loyal to – or why they are loyal – in almost every case there is a long pause, and a look of – well, what is loyalty anyway?

Loyalty is a person’s devotion or sentiment of attachment to a particular object, person or group, an ideal, a duty or a cause [ Encyclopedia Britannica]. But how do you know you are being loyal? What does it really mean and how important is it to the survival of an organization or business?

As you can tell from the title of this entry, I believe loyalty is all that matters. The underlying goal of everything an organization does, should be to develop greater loyalty from its customers/users .

My graduate school thesis was on the impact of leadership styles, and I have been in leadership positions for most of my adult life. I’ve been responsible for improving sales, increasing membership, changing cultures and trying to enhance an organization’s value, but never thought of these activities through the filter of “trying to increase loyalty.” I’ve talked about quality, efficiency, selection, price, value and customer service – but did not organize our efforts by thinking about how to motivate people to be more loyal. I have created this Blog as a place where I can share my efforts over the last 35 years at discovering communication concepts and practices that enable organizations -both For Profit and Non-Profit to develop their customer Loyalty, The blog is organized around my Processes -Concepts and Case Studies that are actual documents from the many different organizations I have worked for and with. I told my kids that ‘the person with the most experiences wins’. They believe that I am winning!

There are several core beliefs that are the underpinning of my concepts and processes. The first is that people inside the organization and the people that engage with the organization will tell you, if asked everything you need to know about creating a loyal work force and customer base. All of my projects start with listening to those that are associated with the organization. I always create a survey that allows me to get a lot of input around a consistent set of thoughts. The questions are always focused on behaviors, as I want to know what you do, not what you think. I always package the notes myself, as the person the takes the notes and processes the notes will always know more about the organization than the people that manage the organization. I will always have at least  one question that asked about hope for the future – as people always need to be looking toward the future. I will always define the problems before I address the solutions-never have a solution that is looking for a problem. Once I get to this point, I have to 2 key concepts for the solution 1] The “Transactional Analysis and Behavioral alignment”[ article link here]  The issue is always in modifying the behaviors which will allow you to hire-train-review-reward- and receive feedback., to support what will make you successful. and 2]I will create a group of initiatives that break the Organization Culture and Communications Strategy development into bite size pieces so they can be manager with in the context of running the day to day operational functions. Change needs to come in chewable bites.

I hope you find some interesting concepts and samples of my work that give you new  critical thinking about the cultural issues you might face. It is through these processes driven by the context of creating user Loyalty that I have lived my business experience. Thanks for spending time wit the loyalty solutions group.