Success in business is, at the core, simple: meet the needs of your customers. The longer you are in business the more you learn and understand what your customers need and don’t need from your product or service.

Over time, as your business gains in popularity and what you offer is in demand, you start to look for ways to cut costs, or to create efficiencies. You start to look at automating “this” or getting your customer to do “that.”

The Evolution of Customer Service

The Airline Industry Example

The airline industry is a great example of this. If you travelled many years ago you will remember having to check-in and drop off luggage with a person. The waits were long, and the process involved humans. Lots of them. Now, you check-in online, print (or not) your boarding pass, get to the airport and navigate a machine to get a bag tag, drop your bag off at another machine, and proceed to security. Only nuances are managed differently, such as oversized luggage or complicated bookings. As a society we seem to have accepted this new form of travel. After all, it gives us options of how to engage with an airline (you can still go to the desk if you want), and it reduces wait times (assuming the machines are working).

Automation and Customer Experience

As the world becomes more and more automated, and we all have the internet at our continuous disposal, companies are requiring us to engage more and more in a way that works for THEM. Their needs are dictating customer behavior.

But there are several examples of where this may alienate or annoy your customer base. If I try to buy a product and am now required to “register” an account, or download an app, or I venture to a store to purchase something to be told I need to order it “online,” I don’t feel like a customer. I feel like a means to the company’s end (profit). And how I conform to the demands of the company on how they want me to interface with them will depend on how important that product or service is to me.

For example, a course I am taking is frustrating for me to navigate. I don’t like the LMS system as it won’t let me learn at my own pace, and they want us to chat and communicate in a specific platform (which I don’t use, keeping me uniformed). My fault? No, theirs. I am the customer.

The Issue with Cashless Transactions

Cash is another thing I am struggling with. Cash is “legal tender.” I am unsure how companies are now saying they don’t (and won’t) accept it. And they tell you this AFTER you have, say, ordered and eaten. Why might I want to use cash?

1. It is not traceable. I don’t need everything I do or purchase to be recorded.

2. It is comfortable to have that back-up. If my card can’t be read, or has been compromised, or I don’t have (or can’t get) one, or if my phone/watch are dead, I have another form of payment.

3. I worked at a bank for years. I like actual money. It’s nostalgic.

4. I can keep it other places for back up (just in case).

Sure, there are disadvantages to cash, and I get that having and carrying cash at some businesses poses risk (theft, robbery, miscounting, loss), but as a consumer I want options.

If I want you buy from me (or I want payment from you), it is my responsibility to meet your needs, not the other way around. And if I don’t want to meet your needs as my customer, then I need to find new customers.

Ontario Auto Insurance Example

Here is another great example. In the world of Ontario Auto Insurance there is a frequent request for providers to work “under protection.” This is basically an “un-retainer” where you do the work and are “promised” payment later. Or, to use an analogy: It’s like saying to a roofer – please put a new roof on my house and I will pay you when I sell it. Bananas, right?

Well, when I had my rehabilitation company I had a hard line of “no” to this type of work. I saw it as bad business as I had to pay my people to do the work without the supporting revenue. It was a cash killer (and I just told you how much I like cash).

In the case of “protection” the lawyers were trying to send me “work” but it wasn’t the work I wanted, or the kind of work that was healthy for my business. So, I found new customers.

The Bottom Line

My point is that people want agency over how they interact with you. Saying “credit only or no service” or “you must use our app” restricts your customer base. If that is what you want, great. But if you don’t, inclusion means finding ways to meet the needs of everyone who wants to give you their money.