Piercy explains that for “all organisations the only thing that really matters at the end of the day is not the technology, or company policies, or computer systems, or products, or even the management …but the long-term satisfaction of customers – this is the only way it can survive.

Piercy goes on to state that the process of marketing goods and services of any kind is incredibly simple in concept or principle, but again and again we have proved , beyond doubt, in organizations, that putting it into practical effect and achieving what we want is excessively difficult.

He believes that there is an urgent need to go back to basics and to clarify the important issues to be addressed in how we want people in our organizations to understand the customer and the role of marketing.

After detailing successful marketing organizations such as Virgin and Body Shop to back up his theories Peircy goes on to state that:-

• you have to get better at going to market – but probably without a marketing department.
• you have to build trusting and close relationships with customers and suppliers – but you can only do that by breaking relationships (the ones your competitors have with those same customers).

For me one of the best lessons from this book is that “Customer perception is reality”.  Piercy states that “the harsh truth is that value is not created in the factory or the back office; customer value exists only on the customer’s terms and reflects the customer’s priorities and preferences. We think that Piercy has got it 100% correct where he states that perhaps one of the hardest things we have to do in building customer focus is simply to listen better to customers.  Where if you can find better ways of listening to customers, the pay-off may be enormous.  The surprise again and again is that customers will actually talk to you and learn how to be better if you are just prepared to listen.

Central Strata uses the ideas and practical advice laid down by Piercy contact us today to find out how we can help your business.

1. Help companies with their existing social media marketing, why because it helps you also.
2. Tagging and other metadata improves the measurement and spread of your information.
3. Use twitter to build your companies personality online
4. Understand that bloggers might care about your customer.  Learn and use their influence to spread your message.
5. Understand which social media websites your customers use and do business.  You can start a community group on Ning, MySpace or LinkedIn.
6. Build your email newsletter content with additional content about your website, providing click through traffic.
7. Learn how people on social media sites are talking about your customer base.  This will help you target your customer.
8. Can you reach more customers and buyers of your service and product.  Learn how your competitors communicate with these customers.
9. Research whether your product or service sells better by recommendation and what would be the best social media sites to connect with your target market.
10. Social media is powered by people.  Learn how to connect with these people through social media.
11. Apologize to your customers if you’ve made a mistake.  Your customers will value this.
12. Spread the good idea and good work of other companies, through your social media activity.  This will build your credibility.
13. Explore your target markets viewpoint of social media.
14. Remember  social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc help push your web presence
15. Build and communicate your business ethics with the use of Social Media, it will pay dividends. 
16. Deliver quality content on your blogs and your site.  It will help your customers feel valued and educated.
17. Remember that the more ways that you can spread the content using social media the better.
18. Understand the technical quality of your website and how you can communicate this.
19. Understand where your websites traffic comes from and benchmark your competitors site.
20. Last of all, learn how to communicate with the wider world and your customer base using social media before you start using  it.

Remember there is more that 20 ways that Social Media can be used to improve your sales…..this is just a few.