How to Prioritize Solving Customer Problems

𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐧’𝐭 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭. 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐝𝐨𝐧’𝐭 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞. They care about one thing: How are you solving their problem? Awhile back we worked with an e-commerce client. They had everything you’d expect—a sleek website. Great product photos. And regular social media posts. But sales were flat. Why? Because their messaging was 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦. “We sell premium this.” “Our products are the best.” “Look at our features.” The problem? Nobody buys a product because the brand says it’s great. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑏𝑢𝑦 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑎𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑠𝑜𝑙𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑎 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑏𝑙𝑒𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑐𝑎𝑛’𝑡 𝑖𝑔𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑒. We switched the focus. Instead of posting polished posts, we dug into their audience’s frustrations: - Shoppers who couldn’t find personalized service. - Customers frustrated with fast shipping promises that were never kept. - People overwhelmed by too many options. We built content around solving those pain points: - A guide that took the guesswork out of online shopping. - Behind-the-scenes videos showing the product in action. - Curated collections for “quick and easy” shopping experiences. The results? Their engagement doubled. Conversions climbed. They weren’t just selling products anymore—they were solving problems their customers cared about. In retail, it’s easy to shout about what you sell. But if you want to stand out, stop talking about yourself and start addressing your audience’s struggles. Because when you solve their problems, they won’t just buy once. They’ll keep coming back. 𝐋𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐮𝐢𝐥𝐝 𝐚 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐋𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐞𝐝𝐈𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐜𝐮𝐭𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐢𝐬𝐞? Start with this: less selling, more solving. 📸 Snapped: Hanging at my favorite shopping center in Kuala Lumpur 🌐

My CX Game Changed When I Realized This… I had a very slim chance of getting initiatives prioritized if I went at it alone. Even if I had an airtight business case justifying the business value, proving the ROI, and making a compelling argument for why it mattered. Why? I wasn’t the P&L owner. I was fighting for customer-centric initiatives in a room full of leaders who owned their P&Ls—each with their own targets, KPIs, and priorities already stacked up. And here’s what I learned the hard way: The strength of your case doesn’t matter if the people holding the budget don’t see the problem as their own. So, if I wanted to get customer experience initiatives prioritized, I needed two things beyond a lock-tight business case: 1️⃣ Cross-Functional Champions I had to stop pushing CX initiatives alone and start co-creating solutions with the leaders who controlled the P&L. The CFO isn’t losing sleep over NPS—they care about customer retention and cost-to-serve. The CMO doesn’t care about your effort score—they care about conversion and repeat purchases. The COO isn’t worried about customer sentiment—they’re worried about efficiency and reducing operational waste. I needed to speak their language and show how CX isn’t a competing priority—it’s a lever for helping them hit their own targets. Winning buy-in isn’t about convincing leaders that your priorities matter. It’s about proving that your priorities help them hit theirs. 2️⃣ Make the Problem Their Idea No one wants to feel like they’re being sold on a problem. But people will fight for their own ideas. So instead of walking into the room with a “Here’s the problem, and here’s my solution” pitch… I flipped it. I led with questions that helped them see the issue on their own. “How are we ensuring our best customers stay engaged and keep spending more?” (CMO) “Do we know what percentage of our support volume comes from delivery confusion, and what that costs us?” (COO) “What if we could reduce refunds and lost revenue by improving delivery transparency?” (CFO) By the end of the conversation, they were coming to me asking how we could fix it—and suddenly, CX wasn’t just my initiative. It was theirs. The Shift: From CX as an Ask → CX as a Business Strategy The reality is, if you’re leading CX, you’re not the main decision-maker. But if you know how to build internal champions and position problems as their idea, you’ll stop being the person who’s constantly begging for CX investment… And start being the person who drives business-critical, revenue-impacting change that gets prioritized every time.

I’ve coached thousands of sellers on how to create the perfect sales pitch using a framework called the 5 P’s. Until today, I have never shared this with anybody except my coaching clients. Here’s why it’s so effective: when most companies create a first call deck or sales pitch, they make it all about their own company and how great they are.   𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐍𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬! The reason why is simple: customers don’t care about your products and services. They care about themselves, achieving their goals, and solving their own problems. Yet most pitch decks fail to speak to the problems which customers face and the pains they are causing. That’s why I created a framework which focuses solely on the customer’s challenges and how your solution can solve them. 𝐈 𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝟓 𝐏’𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐏𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠. 𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞’𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 𝐏 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫: 𝟏. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐦: What problem do most prospects you work with face that your company can solve? The problem should be very high level, and important to Senior Executives at the company. It should be a business problem, not a technical problem. For example, if I sell CRM, the problem I solve would be rep underperformance, low rep productivity, or missed forecasts. All of which are important to a CRO or CEO. 𝟐. 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐨𝐧: Why does the problem exist? What is the root cause of the problem? By understanding the source of the problem, you demonstrate credibility and establish immediate trust with prospects because you are speaking their language. In the above example, I could say that reps often miss their forecasts because leadership has poor visibility to their sales pipeline and no way to accurately predict which deals are most likely to close, all of which a CRM solves for. 𝟑. 𝐏𝐚𝐢𝐧: What pain is the problem causing? The pain is always focused on the metrics that are impacted by the problem. For example, missed forecasts could mean a reduction in stock prices, missed revenue targets, and sales layoffs. 𝟒. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐞: How does your company solve the problem? The promise should always solve the primary reasons you just outlined. So for example, AI driven forecasting would prevent inaccurate manual forecasting and low visibility to deals. 𝟓. 𝐏𝐚𝐲𝐨𝐟𝐟: What metrics do you positively impact by solving the problem? Key payoff metrics for a CRM would be improved rep quota attainment, productivity, and accurate forecasting, all of which drive top line revenue & profitability. In this week's training video, I walk you through how to create the perfect sales pitch using the 5 P framework. You can find the training here: https://lnkd.in/gmu_Bdu3 PS - If you want to access a copy of the Problem Mapping Template so you can fill out the 5 P’s for your own solutions, get it here: https://lnkd.in/gASNe_em

How can we stay focused on every customer’s experience when we operate at the scale of Chase? 🤔 At the Chase Technology Senior Leadership Conference, I had the opportunity to share my thoughts on a crucial aspect of customer service, and I shared something I find myself thinking about often… we need to stop saying "only." As Head of Chase's Infrastructure and Production Management, I’m concerned about any issue that impacts even a small percentage of our customers. This is because at our scale, 1% can mean hundreds of thousands of customers. Given our scale, there can unfortunately be a tendency to say it “only” affects a small number of customers when we have issues affecting our ability to meet our customer promises. But using "only" can diminish the severity of issues and lead to complacency... and considering our scale, we can't afford to be complacent. Using the word "only" stifles curiosity in improving our business and makes us less empathetic to our customers. Here are my suggestions to remove "only" from our vocabulary: • Solve the "Small" Problems: Give teams the time and resources to address minor issues. This allows them to practice empathy and understand the customer experience more deeply. This allows us to address existing customer friction and helps us build better products for customers in the future. • Engage with Customer Challenges: Visit call centers, listen to complaints, or visit a branch and observe how customers and employees interact. Engaging with front line employees and customers directly brings immediacy and emotion to problem-solving, which makes for better solutions. • Focus on Customer Journeys: Establish "customer journey labs" to review pain points and improve experiences from the customer’s standpoint, not the bank’s. As I shared in Nashville with my peers, every minor hiccup represents a real customer with a genuine experience. Let's commit to "sweating the small stuff" and reward our teams for focusing on every customer problem. #CustomerExperience #Leadership