Over the last few months as Resonant Stories has developed, one of the biggest challenges we have faced has been doing for ourselves what we do for other people, i.e. identifying and telling the stories that define our business and help others to understand clearly what we do. The challenge, of course, is that we’re too close to see clearly.
It’s the challenge many businesses have – taking a step back from the detail, from the everyday challenges that consume us, to take a more objective look, to see more clearly what value we really bring to our customers. Making a fair assessment of what you do for your customers requires you to step into your customer’s shoes. So often, the trap we fall into is to focus on ourselves and what we do, not to look at what our customers see us do and the impacts we have on their businesses.
To step into their shoes we have to put aside our own view of the world; actively listen to the language our customers use when talking about us (online and offline); review all the ways they interact with our brand; and measure the impact we have on them. Only once we’ve done this can we truly reflect on how we impact their businesses and project to others what we can do to help them.
We’ll be stepping into our customers’ shoes as often as we can over the coming months – how about you?