The cases of business fads are far the legendary ones both in the international as well as in the domestic markets of Nepal. Everyone remembers the beginning. However, hardly anyone does remember the death of businesses which were fads.
When we consider the markets in Nepal and how they are trying to attract customers to fads, there are various multi million or billion rupee ventures we can identify. Some examples could be a recent cable car venture, a recent robotic restaurant or even a recent very expensive mall. Some other notable examples in this list could be many billion rupee hotels, supermarkets, very expensive clubs, and very big business complexes being built for the types of customers that are never there.
All these are examples from our society where we try to present a product with bells and whistles. The society is presented with a multi-million or billion rupees tag. The investors and promoters of the businesses then hope and pray that their customers pay at least one visit to those imposing locations in a lifetime.
As the concept begins, so the story ends. These businesses, which were chasing some fad, are confronted with big loss as they are unable to pay the loans of banks. In addition, it’s also a heavy loss of grey money of many people whosoever had invested. Finally the business becomes a loss of a lifetime to remember or rue until one dies.
The famous Jim Collins — American writer and lecturer in the area of company sustainability and growth — in his books calls such a scenario: “firing the only expensive canon ball you have before understanding where the target is”. If you had a few inexpensive bullets and an expensive canon, you would fire bullets first one by one to determine the target and then fire the expensive canon to finally destroy the target.
But here are our ambitious crowds which don’t like to fire a bullet first and directly aim with our only canon ball which makes the business go down all at once. It’s a matter of one opportunity. if missed, it spells doom and means that the game is over for the businessman.
So why did not the customers come back again and again after the business started collapsing? But then, is this the right way to reflect on the problem? Or is it better if we first designed the whole business first on paper in a way to attract the customer again and again? Would it be a better way to do business?
It’s a question left to you. It’s a question of visualizing the shape your business will take beforehand and not first jumping in the water and then deciding whether or not you know how to swim. Well, our purpose is not just to be bitter about the realities but to make people aware, too, that their businesses need not be destroyed this way.
There is another path to do business as well. Perhaps calling this path as a “middle path” would be appropriate. The “middle path” allow you to start again. Even if the customers are not coming back, you can try out strategies to bring them back with something or anything that works.
Interestingly, the most effective of these things is that there is something that works but costs absolutely nothing. Yes, you read it right: it costs nothing. How and why?
It costs nothing because it relates to the type of service given, type of memories provided to the customers, type of service drama played to excellence on a product which already has great bells and whistles, creating schemes for the customers to come back craving again and again, and finally, creating an environment of making raving fans of the business.
This is possible with the human beings involved in the business. It does not need the help of the robots or robotics. Humans obviously prefer humans if the human interactions happening are happening in the right way. For the human interaction to become right, you need training and excellent service drama training which don’t create mental trauma to the customers due to untrained staff.
This is the need of the business, not these blood bells and whistles and billion dollar nonsense business which take over the scarce resources such as electricity, water, forests, air quality, land use, etc. However, since, by now, we have already created these ugly monuments, we have no choice but to bear the brunt. Let’s face it bravely then. Let’s train our most valuable assets — the people — properly to serve our most valuable customers to make them customers for life.
Let them burn beautiful billion dollars but burn them to make people happy and not to become an object or target for satire for the entire world to ridicule themselves all their lives. This might make dreaming big even worse in the future for the next generation but we have to think about them if not for you.
In Nepal, the concept of service excellence and its crucial role in any business is yet to sink in the minds of the business owners. We hear the phrases like “customer is always right” or “customer is the king” but do not really grasp the essence of timeless truth hidden in these phrases.
Researches have proved that a business would not fizzle out like a fad if appropriate strategies are put in place to sustain customers’ loyalty. Substantial and substantive strategies and efforts are essential for developing customer loyalty.
Service excellence is a key and vital factor in sustaining customer loyalty. Only when customers develop a sense of belonging and ownership with a brand or product would they come back again and again.
(A writer and analyst, AK Vanprasthi is the Consulting Managing Editor of Pariwartankhabar.Com. He has worked in senior positions in the financial sector in the past. Nischaya Subedi is a Consultant Strategic Manager based in Kathmandu. He holds a B.E. degree in mechanical engineering and an MBA.)
