When Is a Person a Customer?

19. July 2009 by The Original Bulldog - Bob Griffin.

I have gone many rounds with franchisees, small business owners, and fellow employees on this one question.  If you think everyone is a potential customer, you may be right.  You also may be wasting time, money, and energy in the pursuit of everyone and get no one.

The funny thing is most people don’t think about who a customer really is and then act on it.

Is a customer someone who thinks about your business when they have a need to fill? No!  Just thinking about your business is nice, but not very profitable. They aren’t anywhere near your business to spend money and you have no way to sell more to someone just thinking about your services (although technology is advancing daily).  This is point where you can get good word-of-mouth advertising - as long as the words they are saying make someone want to visit your business.

Is a customer someone who enters your store?  Nope, sorry. That is still a POTENTIAL customer and can just as easily walk right back out. To that point, are you sure you really know how many people walk in and do not buy anything? You always hope you do, but there can be a number of customers who are ignored, seen but not talked to, or even talked to with the useless phrase, “Can I help you with something?” In any case, this is not a customer.

How about when a customer pays for a product or service? We are getting closer, but this is still not a customer. How can that be? Many people just visit a location to “check it out” and see if the service and the products are good. But, they may be shopping around for a store to buy from and not be a customer yet. Buying from a business once just makes you a spy. They come in, look around, take a mental note of the quality of the operation and then leave. This person can not be considered a customer.

Since the readers of Business Bulldog are above average, I can now confirm what you are already thinking.  A customer is a person who spends money with you repeatedly.  This also implies that you must keep the customer coming back.  I asked a manager recently, “If a celebrity were to walk into your establishment how would you treat him or her?”  The answer was that she would so everything imaginable to make it an amazing experience.  I then asked who a regular customer is and how do you treat him or her?  The reaction I got was decidedly different.  Many people say, “Why spend money on people who are already going to come in?” The answer is clear when you consider that they may not come in if you do not treat them well.  Also, think about the money they spend trying out your competition. 

A customer is only a customer when they come back.  Treat them well, give them reasons to come back, go beyond their expectations, and ask them to come back often. You may only have one chance at a good first impression, but you have many more chances to lose a customer because you have not defined what a customer is.

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