Most small business owners can probably draw a Venn diagram in which one circle contains “what I love to do” and the other contains “what the market wants me to do.” Where the two overlap, that’s where you’ll find success. That’s where your customers are.

The customer is at the center of everything successful small businesses do. While it would be great if you could simply do only what you want to do and make the kinds of products you like, it’s important to remember why businesses exist in the first place: to meet the needs of a group of people in a way that isn’t currently being met. In order to do that, you have to understand your unique selling point, identify your ideal customer, and develop products that your customers want. And once your products are out there, you have to refine your offering to continue to meet your customers’ needs. In short, you have to approach product development strategically by listening to the voice of the customer.

The Voice of the Customer

The customer’s voice speaks to you through data: targeted surveys, product reviews, documented customer service interactions, information gleaned through social listening. Releasing a product and waiting to see if it sells or not is not enough. Data will help you determine what customers love or hate about a product so that you can further refine your offering. Surveys and customer service data will clue you in on features that customers would like to see. Product reviews will let you know exactly how products are and are not meeting customer expectations. In every customer interaction, you are listening for ways to make your products better, even if your customers already think they’re pretty good.

The customers whose voice you’re listening to don’t even have to be your customers (yet). Social listening involves following conversations online around products like yours. You’ll gain insights into customer pain points and the features existing products lack so you can better meet the needs of the market.

There is a lot of data from disparate sources to sift through, and it’s all coming from, passing through, and ending up with different departments, from customer service to marketing to operations. The best way to collect it, analyze it, and integrate it into product decisions is with a CRM system. Not sure which CRM is right for your business? Our technology experts are here to help you assess your needs and find the balance of features and investment that is right for your business.

Products Rooted in Customer Needs

Incorporating the voice of the customer into your product development strategy results in products that people want to buy. When you develop products that serve a purpose and address customer pain points, marketing becomes less about convincing people that they need a product and more about just getting it in front of the right people and letting it sell itself. This customer-centric approach to product development has the added benefit of closing the gap between business and customer, creating the sense that the customer is also a collaborator or co-creator of the products they love.

Streamline Your Offering and Inventory

Unless the restaurant in question is The Cheesecake Factory, sitting down at a restaurant and seeing 50 items in the menu is usually a red flag. It means this restaurant doesn’t have an identity or a signature dish or a style of cuisine they’re particularly good at. On top of that, there’s no way they can stock enough fresh ingredients to make all of these dishes. A restaurant with six or seven dishes to choose from, on the other hand, has found the balance between what they’re good at and what their customers want.

The same is true for just about any business. When you find yourself adrift with no clear offering strategy, you might just throw new products at the wall and see what sticks. If you’re listening to the voice of the customer, on the other hand, you don’t have to guess, and you don’t have to risk ending up with a bloated inventory and no clear identity to market around. You’ll be able to focus on the products and features your customers love without wasting time on the ones they don’t.

Create a Culture of Continuous Improvement

In all aspects of business, every employee should be constantly striving to improve. Even if something is working, there is still room to look for ways to make it work even better. This focus on improvement has to extend to every department to be effective. Incorporating customer feedback into product development is part of building a culture of continuous improvement in your product development department.

Become a Customer-Centric Business

Including the voice of the customer in product development is part of a customer-centric growth strategy. It enlists the customer not just as an end user detached from the process of creation and production but as a co-creator with a part to play in the business they patronize. In B2C, the result is the kind of customer loyalty that comes from knowing that a business actually listens. In B2B, the result is a true partnership that is built to last. No matter your sector, listening to the voice of the customer helps you create the kind of predictable long-term success that helps a business thrive no matter which way the economic winds are blowing.