Customer Insights that Matter
Patrick Barwise
London Business School
Seán Meehan
IMD
Our last book, Simply Better, (Barwise and Meehan, 2004) looked at “differentiation that matters”: that is, differentiation through the eyes of the customer. It was based on evidence that, despite marketers’ obsession with uniqueness, what most customers want are products and services that just work, rather than offering unique selling propositions (USPs). Delivering the basics “simply better” therefore provides “differentiation that matters.”
Our new book, Beyond the Familiar, builds on this by focusing on what managers need to do to ensure that valid, actionable customer insights from a...