From Guesswork to Growth: The CEO’s guide to truly knowing your customer

Dec 5, 2024

4 min read

In 2024, the business landscape is crystal clear on one point: knowing your customer isn’t optional. It’s essential. Yet, for many organisations, understanding their customers beyond superficial metrics remains elusive. Here’s the uncomfortable truth: if you’re operating without deep customer insights, you’re flying blind, and in a market this competitive, that’s a recipe for disaster.

The Case for knowing your customer

When you truly understand your customers, everything improves:

Business Alignment: Your teams align around a shared understanding of who you’re serving.
Less Media Wastage: Clarity about your audience ensures you’re not throwing dollars at the wrong channels.
Consistent Tone of Voice: Messaging across all touchpoints speaks directly to your customer’s needs and aspirations.
Customer Retention and New Customer Acquisition: Both of these groups grow once businesses are clear on who their customers are.
Tailored Experiences: You create offerings that feel personal, relevant, and engaging.
Holistic Improvement: Your brand, customer experience, and products evolve in lockstep with what your customers actually want.

Yet, despite these benefits, far too many businesses still fall into the trap of believing they serve “everyone” or default to “mass market, all of Australia.” Spoiler alert: they don’t.

Common barriers to understanding customers

Why do so many businesses resist the work of knowing their customers? Here are the top excuses:

Lack of Time or Resources: “We’re too busy.”
Rapid Growth: “We’ve grown without it; why start now?”
Perceived Lack of ROI: “Is it worth the investment?”
Mass Market Delusion: “Our product serves everyone.”

These justifications are understandable but short-sighted. The good news? It’s easier than ever to bridge the gap. With modern AI tools, even resource-strapped businesses can uncover deep customer insights quickly and affordably.

The Voice of the Customer: Your business’s secret weapon

This underscores the urgency of adopting data-driven strategies to meet rapidly evolving customer behaviours and expectations.

How SEAM Can Help

At SEAM, we specialise in building Voice of the Customer (VoC) programs tailored to your business. These programs empower you to:

Collect actionable feedback using cost-effective tools
Integrate customer-centric thinking across your organisation.
Identify opportunities to refine your brand, messaging, and products.

Methods to Collect Customer Feedback

Here are some effective ways to gather customer insights, ranging from the most cost-effective to premium options. At the bottom of this article is a more visual representation of the methods in collecting feedback ranked by Cost and Customer Insight and Quality.

Category		Description	Cost
Most Cost Effective	Social Media Comments and Reviews	Analysing unsolicited feedback from posts or reviews.	Minimal
	NPS Surveys (In-House)	Implementing Net Promoter Score surveys internally.	Minimal
	Post-Purchase Surveys	Simple questionnaires sent immediately after purchase.	Minimal
	On-Site Exit Surveys	Asking for feedback as customers leave a website or store.	Minimal
	Customer Feedback in Support Interactions	Gathering insights from customer service teams	Minimal
	Analytics and Behavioural Data	Using tools like Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics to infer customer preferences.	Minimal
Cost Effective Methods	Email Surveys	Sending surveys to your email list using cost effective platforms like Survey Monkey.	Low
	Social Media Listening Tools	Monitoring and analysing customer conversations using tools like Sprout Social, Sprinklr, Brand Watch	Low
	Online Polls	Quick, single-question surveys on social platforms or websites.	Low
	Website Feedback Forms	Embedding forms for visitors to share feedback.	Low
	Live Chat Feedback	Collecting feedback during or after chat interactions via tools like Zendesk.	Low
Moderately Expensive	Customer Interviews	One-on-one interviews conducted in-person or virtually.	Moderate
	NPS Surveys with Analytics	Tracking customer loyalty and satisfaction trends using specialised software.	Moderate
	Online Communities or Forums	Creating branded communities for engagement and feedback. Engaging with them and grouping feedback to identify trends.	Moderate
	Product Usability Testing	Observing how customers interact with products or services.	Moderate
	Customer Satisfaction Surveys (Outsourced)	Conducted by external vendors via phone or email	Moderate
Most Expensive Methods	Mystery Shopping Programs	Hiring professionals to evaluate in-store or online experiences.	High
	Focus Groups	Assembling a group of target customers for in-depth discussions. Costs include recruitment and venue.	Very High
	Ethnographic Research	Observing customers in their natural environment. Requires extensive time and skilled researchers.	Very High
	Customer Advisory Boards	Establishing a panel of loyal customers for periodic insights. Ongoing management and incentives.	Very High
	Professional Market Research Studies	Partnering with research firms for in depth reports and segmentation.	Very High

Culture is key: Driving customer-centricity

Knowing your customer isn’t just a project; it’s a mindset. To truly embed customer-centricity:

Make it part of every new employee’s induction.
Reinforce it in company updates and communications.
Celebrate wins that come from customer insights.
Get all staff to speak to customers, listen to customers.

When I worked for Flight Centre Travel Group we ensured all staff in the marketing department did “A day in the life” of the travel agent. Staff would spend a day at the Flight Centre store interacting with customers, observing the amazing job that travel agents do and understand what customers are looking for. This paid dividends in bringing the customer voice out across all marketing activities.

The payoff is immense. When your teams think like the customer, your media spend is sharper, your experiences are richer, and your products hit the mark more consistently.

You don’t know what you don’t know

Some executives tell me, “We don’t have the team, tech, or budget to make this happen.” The truth? You don’t need to overhaul your operations to start. Even simple steps like post-purchase surveys or analysing website drop-offs can reveal untapped opportunities.

Emerging AI tools now make it easier than ever to transform raw feedback into actionable insights. These technologies deliver faster, more cost-efficient results, empowering businesses to make smarter decisions almost instantly. The sooner you start gathering insights, the sooner you will see measurable growth.

Turn insights into growth

In today’s market, flying blind is no longer an option. SEAM is here to help you set up feedback systems, integrate customer insights into your strategy, and create a culture of customer-centricity that drives results.

Ready to take the first step? Let SEAM turn insights into action and action into growth. The time to truly know your customer and outpace your competition is now.