The automotive industry now goes in search of the hidden customer

Listening to the customer, they say. Yeah, as if that were easy. At one time perhaps, but today... That's the real problem for machine builders: they can no longer find the customer, listen to him and take his advice on board.

In the last century listening was simple. Yes, because customers had no voice, they talked at the bar with four friends. The company that wanted to know their needs and habits sought them out and questioned them, using sophisticated research tools. Psychologists were able to bring out the motivations and value scales that guided their purchases. Beyond the techniques, the central point was the selection of those who corresponded to the identikit of the typical customer: in the case in point, those interested in buying a car, and even of a certain bracket or category. So you listened to who really was a potential customer.

Here it is worth emphasising that the customer, the one who really matters to the company, is the one who pays an invoice or swipes a credit card. They and only they are the ones who add money to the top of the profit and loss account, to then feed the whole economic chain of costs, depreciation and profits. They alone must be listened to because they alone carry the present and the future of the company and those who work in it.

All very banal, until this turn of the century when everything changed. Today everyone talks. There are the social networks that pour thousands of messages and communications into everyone's mobile phones. All customers? No way. But are there customers in this orgy of information? Of course there are. That is the problem. To the ears of marketers comes an abnormal load of messages, in which there are also customers but obviously obfuscated by the masses. It is easy to fall into the trap of believing that these opinions so generously expressed are identifiable with customers' values, needs and habits. Perhaps deluding themselves that when they decide to swipe a card they are acting on opinions freely expressed on social media. It is striking to discover how much the customer is a two-faced Janus, who changes orientation when reality calls him to positive and binding choices.

What's more, today the company is careful about its reputation, which is good and right. But the reputation that matters is the one with its customers. The other, the one with the world, is nice but only becomes relevant if it coincides with what customers think. Between the two groups, the company must favour its customers, without hesitation. Because only they will put money in its balance sheet. Also in the sustainability budget, since no loss-making budget is sustainable.