Research shows customers want to deal with companies that are honest, that they can trust and that make them feel safe. They want to be treated with respect and have their transactions treated confidentially. Customers also want to feel the person they are dealing with will do what they say they are going to do and cares about looking after the customer's interests not those of the company.

These few simple things, would get you well on your way to creating a good customer experience. But studies like these give you only broad indicators of how customers want to be treated. If you want to create a great experience for your customers, you must get to know your customers better so you can tailor the experience they receive to match their particular expectations.

When you do get a more in-depth understanding of your customers' preferences, you will quickly find that one size does not fit all and this will help you understand why so many customers say that service is poor. On the other hand, you will not find that every single customer has totally different expectations. What you will discover is that you can segment your customers according to how they would like to be treated, and this will make it possible for you to 'customise' the experience each segment has when doing business with you. This will lead to a better match between what an individual customer would like to experience and what they actually experience when they do business with you.

For your top customers, you might even be able to customise the experience for each individual.Your customers would certainly notice that if you did. I think treating each high value customer the way they would like to be treated would result in them believing they had received a great experience.