The importance of customer value in uncertain times

Customer value is one of the key success factors for sustainable growth. Rapid change and the combined effect of multiple crises are making short-term priorities more prominent as customers’ attention is shifted to immediate, personal and financial concerns. Customers’ needs are evolving faster than ever, which challenges companies to adapt continuously to new expectations. In an uncertain operating environment, the approaches that worked in the past may not guarantee success in the future.

Customer value at the core of business

Forbes states that customer-centric companies are 60 % more profitable than those that don’t invest in customers. The companies that succeed are those that anticipate and recognise customer needs before they become critical. Understanding customer value isn’t a one-off activity but a long-term, ongoing process, which takes into account both obvious wishes and subtler, often hidden, needs.

It is vital to ensure that customer insight is integrated into every part of the organisation’s daily operations. Beyond R&D projects, customer insight should be woven into client work and sales, marketing, procurement, logistics, production, and digital development. This means transferring customer knowledge between different functions. Only then can insight be harnessed for business development and service improvement. Every expert should understand how to use customer data in their work, and why accuracy, reliability and availability matter.

Even in challenging times, customer value reveals new opportunities for growth

Understanding customer value isn’t limited to your own business; it also extends to customers’ models, lives, trends and wider phenomena. Global shifts can impact customer behaviour and aspirations opening up new business opportunities.

Successful and resilient companies constantly track their customers and changes in the market. They don’t simply wait for change, they adapt to it actively and seek to shape the market through their actions. Corporate responsibility and regulation create new requirements for organisations, but they also change customer needs, roles, and expectations of partners.

Do we understand customer needs? Do we know our customer today and tomorrow?

It’s essential to identify opportunities and areas for improvement through customer value:

• Do we really understand the needs of different target groups?
• Is our target audience clear or is it changing?
• Is our value proposition compelling for global markets?
• What value do our products and services deliver?
• When we look at the customer experience, can we spot how services are used and the pain points customers encounter?
• Do we allow enough time for reflection and analysis of customer needs?