Winning new markets | Sep 30

Gaining a customer-centric edge

Winning new markets | Sep 30

How small businesses can turn customer focus into loyalty and growth

Ian Wylie Journalist, broadcaster, educator

Reading Time 4 minutes

For small-business leaders, ‘customer-centricity’ can sound like yet another piece of management jargon. But McKinsey’s State of the Consumer 2025 report shows that behaviours adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as heightened expectations for value, convenience, and seamless digital experiences, are here to stay. Customers no longer compare your service just with that of your competitors. They compare it with the best they experience anywhere.

So how can small businesses deliver on these demands without overstretching themselves?

Don’t generalise

When considering your customers, one size does not fit all, says Help to Grow: Management alumnus Antony Bellingall, co-founder of Idenfo, an anti-money laundering software provider and consultancy serving more than 850 businesses worldwide. He stresses that customer-centricity starts with recognising differences: ‘Clients’ compliance needs are not uniform,’ he says. ‘There’s a huge difference, for example, between the demands of an international bank and a small high street art dealer.’

In practical terms, that has meant building Idenfo’s platform so that all modules are compliant with regulation, but only the appropriate ones are switched on for individual clients. A global bank may need a full suite of services from dynamic risk assessments to full sanction and media screening, whereas an art dealer may only need assurance that funds are legitimate. The principle for other small businesses? Understand the customer’s true needs, then tailor your offer accordingly.

Guide through complexity

Bellingall also cautions against assuming your customers see the world as you do. ‘It’s easy when designing a product which performs a specialised function to get too caught up in it’. Just because you understand how something works, don’t assume everyone else will too.

For Idenfo, that realisation has translated into a design process that includes non-experts inside the company testing the product. Their feedback has led to features ranging from video help guides to subtle cues on their app. These details help customers who are not compliance professionals to navigate unfamiliar processes with confidence.

And the same logic should apply in any sector where specialised knowledge may risk intimidate clients. Simplify where you can. Provide clear guidance where you cannot. A complicated product or service doesn’t make you appear smarter.

Filter the noise

In Bellingall’s business, the challenge of guiding customers has grown with the rise of artificial intelligence. He recalls one prospect who proudly explained he no longer needed Idenfo because he had fed names into an AI engine. The AI flagged a potential client as risky… because of a trivial hotel review about poor bathroom sanitation. The business lost a potential sale for spurious reasons.

‘AI engines are only as good as the questions asked of them,’ Bellingall warns. The role of the expert is to act as a trusted filter: to help customers ‘see the wheat from the chaff’. That means carefully calibrating tools, testing prompts, and aligning technology with professional standards rather than blindly accepting machine output.

Adapt to feedback

For Bellingall, customer centricity is also about ongoing adaptation. He tells the story of a luxury car-rental company in the Middle East, where traditional know-your-customer checks slowed down the sales process. Agents had to pull clients into offices and run laptop-based checks, often at the exact moment when they were most excited about renting a high-end vehicle.

The feedback was clear: the process needed to be faster and mobile, Bellingall explains. In response, Idenfo developed an app enabling agents to complete ID verification, name screening, and risk assessments on a smartphone in as little as 30 seconds. That innovation, triggered by one client’s frustration, is now being deployed across multiple industries worldwide. ‘One agent’s desire for speed is leading to an improved experience for everyone,’ Bellingall adds. Listen closely to your customers and treat feedback not as criticism but as a roadmap for innovation.

Keep it simple and profitable

‘Being customer centric means profitably meeting customers’ needs,’ says Patrick Barwise, emeritus professor of management and marketing at London Business School, who stresses that customer centricity does not always mean piling on extra features. Sometimes it’s about simplifying and focusing. ‘What matters most for most customers is simple, reliable delivery of the basics at a reasonable price,’ he argues, ‘not the extra features and benefits.’

Barwise also urges leaders to learn from the unhappy: ‘Talk to dissatisfied customers and lapsed customers to find out why they were let down. Then trace the reasons through the business and fix them.’

Small businesses may lack the resources of multinationals, but they often have two advantages: agility and proximity to customers. By tailoring solutions, guiding clients with quality interactions, and adapting quickly, they can turn these advantages into lasting loyalty.

As Bellingall puts it, customer centricity is not about expecting customers to think like you. It’s about shaping your business so that it thinks, and acts, like them.

Ian Wylie Journalist, broadcaster, educator

Ian Wylie is a journalist, editor, and broadcaster for the Financial Times, Guardian, BBC, Monocle, and others. For 16 years he was a staff writer, feature writer, and section editor at The Guardian newspaper. He also teaches on Newcastle University’s undergraduate and postgraduate journalism programmes.

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