Nine out of 10 business owners that I talked to and know, hurt themselves with this topic that I want to talk about. And that’s the process of customer retention.
WHAT IS CUSTOMER RETENTION IN SIMPLE WORDS?
Customer retention is the process of staying in touch with your customers, nurturing the list, having them come back, buy more from you and refer their people to you.
There are three fundamental reasons behind businesses not doing proper customer retention:
1- LACK OF KNOWLEDGE
Number one is lack of knowledge, as they just don’t know that they should stay in touch with their customers, and it’s hurting them!
2- ARROGANCE
I see business owners that say, oh, you know, customers will call me when they need me, I don’t need to call them. They are hurting themselves, their business and their people by that thought.
3- EXCUSES: I DON”T WANT TO BOTHER THEM
I see many entrepreneurs say, I don’t want to bother my people or bother my customers.
QUOTE: By not staying in touch with your customers, you’re hurting them more than you are helping them!
Customer retention is the process of staying in touch with your customers, nurturing the list, having them come back, buy more from you and refer their people to you.
If you stay in touch with your customers, you’re not bothering them at all. If they like you, if they like your service, if they like your product, once you stay in touch with them, you don’t bother them.
I understand that there’s a point where you don’t want to stay in touch too much, like you don’t want to call them every day. You don’t want to email them every day. Although some customers in some companies would love a daily email talking about what you do. And some businesses do that, and their list opens their email and they love it!
WHY IS CUSTOMER RETENTION IMPORTANT?
QUOTE: If you want the business, if you want to grow, if you want happy customers, you’ve got to stay in touch with them. That’s the bottom line.
HOW CUSTOMER RETENTION IS DONE?
Here’s how you do it, you must have a minimum of a monthly email that would go out to your entire list. And everybody gets it, people that opted in into your list, people that inquired about your business, existing customers, past customers, they should all get a monthly email from you.
Email is specifically good because it’s leveraged, you create it once you send it to 1000 people or a hundred thousand people, and you only send it once. You don’t have to call 1000 people. So, it’s leveraged, it takes less time.
You can also do phone calls, we call our list every three or four months, say: hi, see how things are going… have a friendly conversation!
Two or three out of 10 calls turn into more business, new business from the same customer, or we get a referral.
By not staying in touch with your customers, you're hurting them more than you are helping them!
HERE ARE SOME FACTS ABOUT CUSTOMER RETENTION…
You lose about 64 to 68% of your customers if you don’t stay in touch with them because they perceive that you don’t care about them.
I experienced this firsthand, when I bought furniture a couple of years ago, I spent 10 grand on it.
Went out there, bought the furniture, they brought it home, and I paid about about 10 grand. And the salesperson that sold it to me, never called to say: Hey! how’s it going? What is this working? Is there a problem? Are you happy?
Over the next two years, I also bought more furniture for my house, but not from him! Because apparently, 10 grand wasn’t enough for him. So maybe he wanted more business, I don’t know!
But I didn’t go back to that store, I went elsewhere.
Although if he called me and said: hey, we have this deal, we have this thing and that thing going on sale, I would have gone there and bought more furniture that I needed.
But, they didn’t stay in touch. So, they lost me!
If you are not staying in touch with your customers, you’re losing them as well, either to your competition, or their need is just not met and they are just unsatisfied.
If you are not staying in touch with your customers, you're losing them as well, either to your competition, or their need is just not met and they are just unsatisfied.
- For example, if they wanted to buy furniture, they either didn’t buy it, they forgot about it, or they bought it elsewhere.
Depending on what your product your service is, they’ll just get it done elsewhere, or they just won’t do it.
WHAT DO YOU NEED TO GET STARTED WITH CUSTOMER RETENTION?
A simple way for you to start seeing results right away today is:
- You must have a list of your customers
A digital list on either an Excel sheet or on a CRM software to use and stay in touch with them.
- Start sending them emails or start making phone calls.
I understand you don’t want to bother them. But it is the best thing that you call them up, say, hey, it’s me, how’s it going? I just wanted to see how things are going.
Usually, when I follow up with my customers, they’re like, thanks for the follow-up, that means a lot to me. So, they are happy about it!
Don’t even think that you’re bothering them because you’re not.
If you’re trying to provide value, if you’re trying to stay in touch, and you’re trying to provide more, they’re not going to hate you for that. Just try it!
We’re going more in-depth with this process and building systems and processes for our students that attend our course.
It’s called Simple Marketing Formula. We go through building six different basic aspects of your business and your marketing and take it to a whole new level.
We’re working in a group environment where we, work together, get feedback, mastermind, get referrals, get business, go back and forth and much more!
If you’re interested to check it out, go to persyo.com/join-smf/ and check out our mini webinar.
I share the entire process in that webinar, I show you exactly how it’s done. Just by watching the mini webinar, I’m giving away the Simple Marketing Blueprint. So, you can use that and if you know what you’re doing, you could just do it yourself!
However, if you get into a group environment or work with someone that knows what they’re doing, your chances of success will increase significantly.
Hope this helps, try it, let me know what you think.
There are multiple ways to stay in touch with your customers. I didn’t cover all of it.
I wanted to keep the video short and sweet.
So let me know what you think; like this post, share it and leave a comment and let us know what you liked about it or your experience with customer retention.
Let me know if there’s any topic you want me to cover
Have a great day
Your business and marketing coach
Mostafa Hosseini
