Haven’t bothered to take the time to learn about your customers? It could be costing you more than you imagine, so here’s seven ways to make your customers feel special (and hang onto their business).
You know your business inside out, but do you know your customers inside out?
Acquiring new customers is five times more expensive than keeping the ones you already have, so customer turnover could be the largest financial burden for your business. By getting to know your customers and learning how to make them feel special, you build up a detailed picture of them and take steps towards retaining their business.
So, what CRM software can you use to help you know your customers better? How can you increase customer satisfaction? And what can you do to make customers feel special?
Here our some of our ideas for making your customers feel special.
1. It’s all about customer satisfaction
At the end of the day, making sure your customers are valued and feel special should mean retained customers generating long-term business for you, and delivering positive feedback and great testimonials. Without it, customer churn increases and reputation risks damage through negative word of mouth marketing. In fact, in our recent customer experience survey we found that one in three consumers would ditch a company for good after just one below-par experience.
2. How do I increase customer satisfaction?
Understanding what your existing customers want and delivering it to them effectively is the best way to satisfy; meaning you can secure repeat orders, keep and retain your customers and benefit from positive word of mouth. Ways of doing this might include;
3. Customer loyalty schemes
You can immediately make a customer feel special and valued with a reward or loyalty scheme that offers them perks throughout the year…and they might even tell their colleagues and friends about it too!
4. Analysing customer data
Use the data you are gain everyday to find out a little more about your customers – like their propensity to buy at certain times of year or previous products they have bought – anything that might indicate their purchase preferences and behaviours. Then tailor your marketing to fit with the profile you have built up of them – something personalised or highly topical to them is much more likely to get through. Getting the right CRM software, or Customer Relationship Management software, can help with this.
5. Encouraging customer feedback
Giving your customers a chance to engage in two-way dialogue with you is vital. This could be through feedback surveys, social media, review meetings etc. It shows that you are more than just a business; it shows you have empathy and that you want to develop a relationship with customers – no bad thing!
6. Effective complaints management
Customer complaints can be telling, so it’s essential to deal with them efficiently, fairly and ensure the customer receives a satisfactory response and follow up. If a complaint is handled effectively, it can give you important root cause information that may help you to predict future issues or trends.
7. Improved customer service
Customer service needs to be sincere for it to be effective, so it’s vital to ensure that your staff are trained to fulfill this. If your staff can consistently treat all customers with respect and show efficiency, you will gain customer satisfaction and are sure to retain their business in the long-term.
If you’d like to get practical, email me Charles.Pludthura@sage.com
