It may now be cliché to declare that COVID-19 will change everything, but it is still true. As businesses reopen and life slowly returns to something resembling “normal”, reality is going to be different for your customers. What may have been true before the crisis – customer needs, priorities, and pain points – will likely be replaced by a new set of truths when it has passed.
A severe shock to the market – a global pandemic, a financial crisis, an oil embargo – dislocates and disrupts, but also creates opportunity for innovators in new products and services. Events that “change everything” reset everyone’s understanding of what customers need, rendering years of accumulated insights obsolete.
If you are not thinking about how your customers’ needs have changed and will continue to do so, you are missing that opportunity. The winners in the post-COVID-19 marketplace will be the innovators that use the crisis as an opportunity to build a new, unique, and proprietary fact base about changing customer needs before their competitors do. These innovators will gain an early lead in the recovery. Those who wait will find themselves already behind and struggling to stay relevant with old products in a new world.
Watch our video, “5 Tips for Uncovering Changing Customer Preferences During COVID-19” for tips on how to think about Voice of the Customer in this time.
Want to learn more about digital research techniques? Watch our webinar, Virtual Research Techniques for Successful Innovation, to learn how you can uncover deep, transformative insights.
Tags: Voice of the Customer