Nearly 70% of all business lost in America can be directly attributed to ignoring the customer after the sale.
It’s an amazing percentage when you think about it. This may be the area where you have the greatest control. We seem to spend all of our time and effort generating new customers. We lure them with catchy ads. We seduce them with slick brochures, sparkly websites, and other expensive collateral materials. We listen attentively to their problems and help them find creative solutions. We give them a fair price, and then we smile and thank them for their business.
Then… we do nothing. We just ignore them!
There are no hotter or more important new business prospects than your current customers. They liked you and believed in you enough to try you once. Hopefully, they had a satisfactory experience the first time around.
On average, it costs you 80% less to get an existing customer to purchase from you again than it does to generate a new customer.
So why aren’t you talking to them? Why aren’t you telling them more about the other products and services you can also offer them? Why aren’t you asking them to tell you more about what they need?
What you need is a Customer Retention Program.
A Customer Retention Program is critical to the success of any company. Stay in touch with your customers. Reinforce that they made the right decision to work with you in the first place. Let them know what you’re doing and the new products or services you have to offer. You just never know what might happen.
_
Gumas wrote the book on Challenger Brand Marketing. This has been an excerpt from Marketing Smart. A collective of proven marketing strategies and tips to help Challenger Brands take on their larger competitors…and win! Download an E-book version of the Marketing Smart for free here.
