The better approach is to go to the customer and say, “We’ve worked together a long time. You’ve had some massive success and changes within your organization as a direct result of your relationship with us. Would you be willing to share the impact of our work together?” Once the customer shares the success, the impact, and the significance of the

Can you imagine if dating were like this? If you did the exciting stuff with one person, and then, once you committed to the relationship, you were “assigned” to a totally different person?

your CRM, a customer survey may be an efficient way to gather that data for every customer you serve. When conducting these surveys, remember to be short (ask only a few questions), relevant (ask questions the customer can imagine you need to know), and efficient

After experiencing the emotional high of the Admit phase, customers move into the Affirm phase—and their emotional state can take a dramatic turn. This phase is commonly known as “buyer’s remorse.” The customer likely feels fear, doubt, and uncertainty about the decision they just made, and the business must take steps to assuage those feelings.

The Affirm phase of the customer life cycle offers you the opportunity to counter the natural feelings of buyer’s remorse by reinforcing the purchase decision and reaffirming the elements of the offering that initially contributed to the customer’s buying decision.

The first phase your customer experiences is Assess. This phase occurs before someone becomes a customer. In this phase, the potential customer assesses whether your company will be able to solve their problem or provide the product or service they desire. Sometimes the assessing happens on a gut level—customers often don’t know what

or interactions to include regular check-ins on customer progress, communications with customers can go from a one-way, “push” mentality to a more fluid dialogue. Quick email surveys to individual customers

and unexpected delight (resources for leveling up the relationship). Ideally, you want to paint a picture of what life is going to be like now that the customer is working with

“word of mouth.” This concept has