Reacting to Your Customers' Wants

Have you seen the new Chrysler commercials? Chrysler is guaranteeing that you will only pay $2.99 a gallon for gas which you pump into your new Chrysler automobile. This guarantee covers the first 12,000 miles per year for three years. Not a bad deal, huh?

Let's face it. As with many auto makers today, Chrysler's vehicles are not the most fuel efficient. Since Chrysler's inventory cannot easily be changed to be more fuel efficient, the company has a problem. With increasing pressure on consumers due to rising gas prices, vehicle owners are very concerned about how much they are paying to get from here to there. Combine these vehicle owners' concerns with Chrysler's lack of fuel-efficient vehicles, and Chrysler has an even bigger problem.

How is Chrysler addressing this problem?

The company is reacting to customers' wants. The customer wants lower gas prices, and Chrysler is giving it to them. At this point, you may be saying, "Wait a minute. What the consumer really wants is to pay less for the overall gas bill." While that may be true, Chrysler does not have the ability change the fuel efficiency of its vehicles and offer an overall lower gas bill today. What Chrysler can offer is to cap the price that customers pay for a gallon of gas. That offer addresses customers' concerns by stabilizing the price they will pay for gas. It creates an intersection of what Chrysler can offer and what the customer wants. Wisely recognizing this intersection, the company turned a stable price for a gallon of gas, $2.99, into its latest promotion.

This could be a costly venture for Chrysler. Depending on how high gas prices rise, Chrysler is committing to covering hundreds, perhaps over a thousand, dollars per vehicle per year. To Chrysler, that may seem a small price to pay to get sales today. Hopefully, their guess as to how high gas prices will go is correct, or they could be taking on more than they anticipated.

Either way, Chrysler is reacting to what customers want. Their customers want to pay less for gas, and that is what Chrysler is offering them.

We can take a lesson from Chrysler. We can learn to react to our customers' wants. We can wisely make this a regular practice rather than only employ it in a crisis situation such as Chrysler finds itself in today. Are you doing this? Do you react to your customers wants? Do you adjust your offerings to pressures that your customer is feeling? What are the pressures on your customer today? How do these pressures affect your customers' dealings with your business?

To find out, talk to your customer.