I recently signed up for a very expensive service from someone who positions himself as an expert, no, THE expert in his field. I was given a lot of promises which made the large investment a no-brainer.
I have pretty high standards and, over the years, I have learned to lower them. And lower them some more. So, even with the hype, I wasn’t expecting everything which was offered to the degree it was positioned.
However, after a possible 20% delivery and 80% disappointment, and having given said-company ample time to catch up with themselves, I was told they were too busy to deal with it. They had new customers to deal with. New customers are EXCITING. Problems are boring – or so they believe. He is operating the customer churn and burn strategy.
This individual is pretty charismatic. He is good at winning new business. However, his reputation is being tarnished because he is good at customer attraction and very poor at customer retention. Given that keeping a customer is less expensive than attracting a new customer. And that there are only so many customers in the world, no matter how charismatic you are, looking at how to keep the ones you have is an important part of your business strategy.
Brand management and reputation management are key to this. So, a couple of questions for you:
- Do you have a customer retention strategy?
- How effective is your customer retention?
- What would your customers say about you if you weren’t in the room?
- What would your customers say are your most redeeming qualities?
- What would your customers say is most frustrating in dealing with your company?
Here are some of the customer retention strategies I teach my clients:
- Make sure your systems make it easy for them to do business with you
- Offer only quality service and quality products
- Have a quick turnaround on queries
- Be easy to get hold of
- Acknowledge every communication
- Treat existing customers with as much care as you do prospects, if not more so
- Under-promise and over-deliver – this on its own will set you apart from the competition
- Stay in touch
Your customers will forgive you a lot of you care about them.
Tricia Woolfrey is an integrative business coach helping people like you and companies like yours perform at their best, so that you can be more profitable, with less stress and with your integrity intact. Call 0845 130 0854 for a free telephone consultation.
© Tricia Woolfrey 2014
Customers are the lifeblood of any business. It doesn’t matter how good your product or service, if you don’t have customers willing to buy, you have nothing. In such challenging times, and considering the cost of attracting just one customer (have you ever done the maths on this?), customer retention is a stronger strategy than customer attraction could ever be.