All business begins and ends with the customer. The company with the most customers wins, which is why successful companies know that the real marketing begins after the initial sale has been made. They know doing everything possible to retain the trust and the business of current customers is the essence of marketing. People like to do business with companies that: truly value them as customers; know them by name and buying preference; regularly consult them as to their satisfaction with purchases; ask for their preferences regarding future products and services; handle complaints and inquiries promptly. All businesses can and should do all of these things and more. The problem is that most businesses dont have a systematic and effective approach to customer retention. This is because the mindset of most businesses is to pursue new customers at the expense of paying too little attention to current customers. A good marketing plan emphasizes retaining customers. It says the best way to retain customers is to provide continuing satisfaction and reinforcement to individuals that are, or have been customers. Most marketing plans concentrate on getting customers, whereas a good marketing plan zeroes in on keeping them. Its goal is to make good customers into even better ones. The cost of constantly acquiring new customers is high and sometimes prohibitive for small businesses. With current customers, the business has already paid the acquisition costs and customers tend to increase their spending over time. This means that the additional business a company does with its current customers will more profitable than with new customers. The era of the mass consumer has been over for more than a decade, yet many businesses still dont understand this. Todays consumer wants to be treated as an individual, not as part of a broad category. What this means is that information on generic consumers has become less and less useful, while information on individual customers has become essential for business success. To be successful businesses must develop relationships with each customer and conduct their businesses in a totally customized fashion. Relationships depend on familiarity and knowledge and the best way to do this is by having a customer database. Your database should identify the names, addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses of todays customers as well as past customers and prospective customers. The database will enable your business to know your customers as individuals with specific identities and buying preferences. It even allows you to know the profitability of each customer. If your business has a web site and every business should, obtaining this information has never been easier. You can do it in a variety of ways such as, memberships, contests, letters, customer surveys, newsletter registrations, financing applications. The best way to build long-lasting customer relationships is to increase customer satisfaction with every contact they have with your business. All interactions customers have with a business, its people, its services, help determine their perception of quality and value. This is why it is essential that you know as much as possible about the customers interactions with your business. You cannot afford to make assumptions about how customers purchase, use, and obtain service for their produces or services. You must know these facts precisely. To fully identify and manage customer interactions you have to first identify your customers interactions with employees; then you have to motivate your employees to satisfy the customers; finally you need to be able to monitor the quality of service that your customers actually experience. Putting a system like this in place will take any assumptions about customers perceptions out of your marketing. An essential part of marketing is a customer satisfaction program. This is a program that periodically solicits customers views on what they want from your company, how they expect it to perform, and what satisfaction they receive from your products, services, and delivery systems. You must actively solicit customer feedback. You cannot wait for it. Providing your customers with written, visual, or other forms of communication outreach is vital part of marketing. These types of communications build stronger relationships. Publications and other forms of contact will allow you to communicate regularly with customers who are distant geographically or are infrequent purchasers. Besides newsletters and frequent emails, there are other ways of maintaining customer contact. For example, Company DVDs can demonstrate the quality if your companies offerings, reaffirming to the customers the value of the product or service they are buying. Affinity merchandise such as, coffee mugs, T-shirts, beach towels, and tote bags that have your company logo or message on them are excellent ways to maintain contact with customers. If current customers represent the best sources of additional business, then lost customers are the second best. Lost customers are a result of defects in your marketing plan. They represent signs of failure in your system. As with any failure, the best way to fix it is to search out the cause. Loosing a customer my have greater consequences than you are aware of. It costs time and money to replace a lost customer, but you can greatly reduce those costs by retaining more current customers. In general, a customers value tends to increase each year with your company. This is true for three reasons: first, peoples income and purchases tend to grow throughout their working lives; second, with established customers, operating costs decline, theres no need for example, to repeat credit checks; third, as customers get to know and trust your business, they may be willing to pay even more for your products and services. Most businesses lose customers because they somehow fail to meet their expectations. They take expectations for granted, rather then managing them. In other words helping customers form and shape their expectations. Expectations and customer appreciations dont take place in a vacuum. Theyre formed as a result of information that is supplied by your company. Its important that make sure never to create unrealistic expectations. Your goal in all of your marketing communications and all sales and service contacts with your customers is to help form realistic expectations. When people know what to expect they tend to be happy and contented customers. If you want to make sure you are constantly forming realistic expectations for your customers, remember this phrase from best selling author and speaker Harvey Mackay; Always underpromise and overdeliver. A high quality product or service alone will not ensure your success. Instead, the key factor will be relationships with customers developed after the initial sale has been made. Businesses in the 21st century, if they are to be successful, must concentrate on achieving strong, sustainable customer relationships. Businesses who understand that the real marketing begins after the initial sale will focus their energies on things such as, knowing who their customers are, handling complaints with openness and enthusiasm, using newsletters to spread their message, and their ultimate goal will be complete customer satisfaction. Business that do these things will be successful beyond their wildest expectations. Copyright2006 by Joe Love and JLM & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide. |
