A 35-minute watch.

Rowan Jackson is chief of Promising Outcomes, a consultancy that aims to improve profitability by driving better relationships with clients. In our latest OctoBlast interview with Lee Robertson, Rowan discusses the reasons behind the firm’s strategic direction and how their work applies to, and key takeaways for, financial services.

The core of Promising Outcomes philosophy surrounds the reams of data that show a big part of profitability lies in client loyalty, and that the perception of value is key to this: “we all want value from our service, and value breaks down into four components”. He then discusses these components.

Within financial services, Rowan makes the point that trust is a big part of client relationships, and that with relatively commoditised products, the service element is crucial, as 70% of customers switching product providers do so because of service.

When asked what key takeaways there were from his work in the industry, he highlights “it’s quite surprising that some organisations do no measurement of their relationships with their customers”, and that you therefore need proper “sales people, not order takers”.

Rowan also gives his view on whether smaller firms perform better than large, and outlines the surveys they conduct with clients.

For more from Rowan, here’s his 3 Questions.