Customer Reviews

Passionate & Profitable: Why Customer Strategies Fail and 10 Steps to Do Them Right!

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I had the privilege of reading "Passionate & Profitable" over the past couple of weeks. This book is well worth the investment in time. There are quite a number of useful nuggets of information here, as in the customer segmentation analysis and the customer experience mapping models. Customers drive business needs, this is the bottom line. If you want happy customers then get some passion and figure out why they are your customers in the first place. It sounds simple, but it isn't. Arussy does a fine job explaining the pitfalls, and offers mechanisms to steer you in the right direction. Also, if you have ever had the chance to attend a "training" class, you will soon find out why you should have been in an "education" class instead. There is a difference as Arussy points out. Get this book and read it, then give it to a friend and have her read it also. But have her get her own copy; you will want yours back.
-Scott Feldman

I've had the pleasure of attending Lior's seminar and I was extremely impressed with his passion towards the subject of customer experience and focus. After the seminar I read his book and I was not disappointed - it's a goldmine - full with insights and concepts that are right on money. Share this book with your peers...I did - it helped me drive some great new ideas in my organization.

I bought this book because I was buying another one of Lior's books, and I am glad I did. This book is a great book if you want to change the way your company does business and how it treats it's customers. Like other reviews about this book have said this book gives you basic principals on how to build better customer "relationships" (not relations, notice the "ship" at the end) with your customers. I am an IT Director for a company, and have a side network consulting business and I have put the ideas in this book to use in both places. If you buy this book and don't get anything out of it, at least take this little nugget:

"Remeber your customer is the reason why you are in business." -- Lior Arussy, Passionate & Profitable: Why Customer Strategies Fail and 10 Steps to Do Them Right!.

Passionate & Profitable: Why Customer Strategies Fail and 10 Steps to Do Them Right has a rather simple premise - spending time and money on customer retention is of no value if it is not done in the context of having a well-defined execution strategy.

The goal of the book is to show the reader how to form strong, sustainable, and profitable relationships with customers. The challenge is that there are many critical decisions and trade-offs that have to be made, but many companies often make the wrong decision. Another issue is that many companies live by the credo of `Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door'. The problem is that even with the best mousetrap, the world won't come if you don't have a well-developed customer strategy. Passionate & Profitable is all about creating that well-developed customer strategy.

The book is worth it alone for the 25-question corporation-customer experience aptitude survey on pages 19-20. The survey examines the health of your relationship with your customers and is likely a good indicator of your profitability.

Another great section is pages 109-115 which goes into the organization-focused vs. customer-focused organizational structure. This section shows how many organizations are created with functional expertise via groups, i.e., engineering, R&D, sales, operations, etc. Arussy shows that a customer-centric organization must have the customer focused in the center, with the various groups supporting those customers. The beauty of a customer-centric organization is that all of the employees and functions are fully aligned around the customer cause.

Chapter 8 reiterates the importance of organizations training their employees and trusting them to make the correct decision. A focal point is that if you do not trust your people, do not hire them. And if you hired them, give them the tools to excel. After all, their success is your organizations success.

For those organizations that are serious about their customer strategy and looking for ways to improve it, Passionate & Profitable is a valuable book that can help achieve that goal.

Excellent book. A great answer to those they think that the customer is part of their graphs.

Excellent and prescriptive book that details how to get customer strategies right. Arussy points out that companies certainly are not lacking in intention or initiative - customer-related activities, undertaken as "initiatives," "programs," or "campaigns" typically run for short periods of time but as he presents, are never really embraced as a full operational strategy. To the contrary, the customer mantra gets plastered all over company headquarters, on t-shirts, in brochures and advertising and shortly afterwards, is forgotten. This book reveals the secrets to sustainable customer success through the improvement of the customer experience and mutual company and customer gain.

Arussy's done it again. This book has practical stuff that really does work. I've seen it help organizations go from dream to reality using these steps. The dramatically improved business results in the organization were beyond what anyone expected.
It's not fluff, the step by step process makes it doable. The advice is simple and sound. It works. Arussy talks "everyman's" language and the content is applicable for type every organization.
Don't hesitate to recommend it to your boss.

I've read all of Lior's books and been through his workshop. He always nails the topic and this book is no exception.

This book reminds us that innovation does not happen by accident but is the result of a well developed customer strategy.

I found the use of real life examples combined with surveys and activity sheets really helped me develop a servicing strategy that was right for my organization.