Learning 04 - Explain how a

commitment to customer success is the

highest level of customer management.

Customer Success is helping customers to

meet their real business requirements.
 A customer success program involves a
thorough understanding of individual customer
requirements and a commitment to focus on
long-term business relationships that have high
potential for growth and profitability.
A supplier must work intensively with a
customer to understand the customers
requirements, internal processes, competitive
environment, and what it takes for the customer
to be successful in its own competitive arena.
Further, the supplier organization must
understand how it can utilize its own capabilities
to enhance customer performance.
 The use of the term relationship implies at
least two participants, in this case a customer
and a supplier. Just as suppliers must manage
relationships with their customers, customers
also have programs in place for managing
relations with their suppliers.
Ideally, the supplier develops a comprehensive
understanding of competition and strategy for
each level of customers within its supply chain.
Then it can develop programs that ensure that
its immediate customers are successful in
meeting the requirements of customers further
down the supply chain.
 To achieve customer success, a
supplier may need to reinvent the
way a product is produced,
distributed, or sold. It often requires
suppliers and customers to
collaborate in ways that create new
relationships, processes, and other
avenues for success.
 For example, the Get Real story about Tesco
shows how a major retail company understood
the unique needs of a segment of its customers
in South Korea, and developed a totally new
approach to online retailing which made the
entire shopping experience more convenient for
those consumers. Companies that are adopting a
customer success focus have also been leaders
in implementing customer relationship
management programs (discussed next) as a
tool for accomplishing customer success.