Ten Tips for Long-Term Client Retention
Attracting and retaining clients is essential to the success of any business. Long-term clients are likely to feel more satisfied, are more likely to refer others, and are more likely to purchase additional products and services from you. Here are 10 solid strategies for retaining your long-term customers and making sure your new customers stick around.
1. Market to your existing clients. Your current customers are already doing business with you and are more likely to buy from you again. Focus most of your time, efforts, and resources on better serving your current clients. Go deeper instead of wider.
2. Be consistent in your approach and interactions. Treat your clients with honesty, humor, and respect — and maintain this over time. If you are consistent with them over time, they will see you as dependable, credible, and trustworthy.
3. Follow through on your commitments. If you promise to send information or to follow up, do it. You will gain loyalty and trust by always doing what you say you will do.
4. Connect with your customers. Find out about their lives, their hopes, goals, and desired outcomes. Ask questions that encourage a deeper sense of shared understanding. The greater the level of connection, the greater the mutual satisfaction.
5. Have fun. It’s easy to get caught up in goals, outcomes, and deliverables. Of course these are important, but clients also want to work with people who enjoy what they do. The more fun you can have while providing strong outcomes, the longer your clients will stay. Read more
Dan Kennedy – Fix Your Follow Up, part 3
Recession Immunization
Following are areas of your business that need to be scrutinized to optimize profitability.
1. Who you sell to - this matters more than anything else.
2. What you sell
3. How you sell
4. How you follow up
To attract the best-qualified customers, all others must be driven away. This takes courage; courage to stand firm in the belief that not considering everyone as your customer is in your best interest.
Dan’s Recession Prescription #1: Sell to a buyer. This is not as obvious as it may seem. Read more
5 Ways to Increase Profits NOW
Here are more recommendations from Dan Kennedy.
1. Always offer 3 choices… good, better, best
2. Raise prices - the weak will fall away, and the stronger will commit
3. Target better customers. This doesn’t mean only targeting people with more money. It also means to sell to people who want what you have.
4. Offer IMMEDIATE upsells - the best time to sell something to someone is right after they have just bought something. Make more money by having more stuff to sell (good, better, best stuff).
5. Multiply customer purchases with post-purchase follow-up. Send a thank you note, congratulations on your purchase, provide information about what was purchased, “buy this, too”.
Remember, always offer good, better, best.
Thanks for taking time to read my blog. Your time is precious and I appreciate you having spent some of it with me.
Contact me at georgann at catchphrasemarketing.com, or call me at 877-434-9019, with any questions you may have about electronic marketing (email, newsletters, ezines) or to discuss how using these marketing methods can quickly improve your business’ profitability. I can show you how to do it, or I can do it all for you.
Also, you can go to my web site www.catchphrasemarketing.com to get more information on the benefits of using email marketing in your business.
Georgann McCrosson
Dan Kennedy - Fix Your Follow-Up
Dan Kennedy hasn’t spoken publically for 8 years. The planets aligned last Tuesday and I got to see Dan speak at the Anaheim Convention Center.
Dan’s opening statement was “We don’t have a bad economy. What we have is really bad follow-up.” That was the lead in to an hour and a half of clear, insightful examples of how businesses owners sabotage themselves and their bottom lines by simply ignoring the people who have already raised their hand.
There are four reasons a lead-generated prospect doesn’t take the next step.
1.) They didn’t pay attention
2.) It was a mismatch, they wanted ‘a’ and rejects your offer to get it
3.) Price or ability to pay
4.) Distrust – wants ‘a’, accepts your way of getting it, but doesn’t believe you.
Your follow-up program must be engineered to deal effectively with ALL FOUR reasons. Is it? Everybody shows up once. Show up more than once and you’ll be a star. Show up by mail, email, telephone. Do it, do it often and keep doing it. If yours is a long selling cycle, you can speed it up by creating more trust. More trust is created by more contacts. Dan recommends reading Chapter 13 of his book No BS Direct Marketing
Follow up procedure must be done the same way each time. Why won’t it get done? Here are some reasons:
1.) It’s work!
2.) It’s complicated
3.) It’s hard to do manually
Of course it’s complicated! No one will copy what you’re doing. Celebrate complexity because it sets you apart from everyone else trying to sell something.
There’s plenty more to report on this seminar. Please come back by to get more of Dan’s wisdom. See all of Dan’s books here
Contact me at georgann@catchphrasemarketing.com, or call me at 877-434-9019, with any questions you may have about electronic marketing (email, newsletters, ezines) or to discuss how using these marketing methods can quickly improve your business’ profitability. I can show you how to do it, or I can do it all for you.
Also, you can go to www.catchphrasemarketing.com to get even more information on the benefits of using email marketing in your business.
How to Successfully Build Customer Loyalty
|
By: R.l. Fielding |
|
|
In today’s competitive marketplace the race to increase profits by cultivating customer loyalty is going at full speed. Customer retention is not only a cost-effective and profitable strategy, it is a necessity for businesses wanting to stay ahead of the pack. As consumers are spending less thanks to soaring fuel and food costs, companies are more reliant than ever on the loyalty of a dedicated customer base to maintain a competitive advantage. Following the Pareto Principle, 80% of your sales come from 20% of your customers, and in a recession the numbers are closer to 95% and 5%, says Ajit Maira, senior vice president of the Information Technology Services Marketing Association. Since these returning customers cost less to reach, are less vulnerable to ploys from the competition and buy more over time, companies need to give customers an incentive not to go elsewhere for the same product or service. One of the most successful ways to achieve this cost-effective retention is through the use of customer loyalty reward programs. By rewarding the ongoing purchase of product or services, companies achieve long-term relationships with customers. With a variety of loyalty programs available to companies, the key is discovering what works best for your needs and goals. Build a Strong Foundation Read more
Benefits of Customer Retention: Statistics
August 3, 2008 · Filed Under Client Retention · Comment
Benefits of Customer Retention: Statistics 1. Acquiring new customers can cost five times more than satisfying and retaining current customers 2. A 2% increase in customer retention has the same effect on profits as cutting costs by 10% 3. The average company loses 10% of its customers each year 4. A 5% reduction in customer defection rate can increase profits by 25-125%, depending on the industry 5. The customer profitability rate tends to increase over the life of a retained customer 6. Companies can boost profits anywhere from 25 to 125% by retaining merely 5% more existing customers. 7. Only one out of 25 dissatisfied customers will express dissatisfaction. 8. Happy customers tell 4 to 5 others of their positive experience. Dissatisfied customers tell 9 to 12 how bad it was. 9. Two-thirds of customers do not feel valued by those serving them. Thanks for reading my blog. I appreciate you spending some of your valuable time with me today! I am available on Tuesdays between noon and 2:00PM Pacific time for a consultation to determine if your business has hidden assets that can generate additional profit. These consultations are limited to 15 minutes since only 8 are available each week. To schedule your consultation, write me at georgann at catchphrasemarketing.com with the date and time you would like. Please submit your reservation no later than the Friday prior to the date you are requesting. Your appointment will be confirmed by email within 24 hours.
Do You Really Aim To Please?
August 2, 2008 · Filed Under Client Retention · Comment
|
