Understanding customer needs

Abstract

Since many influences bear on customers' decisions to buy, an ongoing multivariate approach to understanding customers' needs is advocated for every organization. It is demonstrated here. Influences on art lovers' behavior in choosing a price to pay for a piece of art, on their art-buying habits, on their volunteering time to work at an art museum, and on their making financial donations to an art museum are examined. Factor analysis, the method used for data analysis, is tracked from its invention to current use. Folding insights about customers' needs into accomplishing and tracking appropriate innovations in an organization's operations, then assessing how the innovation affects organizational outcomes, is outlined. The methods and advice apply to organizations of every kind.