Sixteen Ways To Retain Customers And Establish Customer Loyalty

Most dissatisfied customers leave without saying anything, and do not give you the chance to retain their loyalty at all.

According to the results of the American technical assistance research project, high quality products or services are crucial to customer loyalty.

However, it is equally important to solve problems through good customer service.

In some industries, those who solve problems are more loyal than customers who have never met problems.

Poor customer service hurts profits.

In the field of high technology, 90% of the customers who have problems, but are satisfied with the solution, will purchase from the same manufacturer again, which is more loyal than the customers who have not had problems before 83%.

The reason is that customers often regard your service and quality declaration as propaganda slogan. If you can deliver what they say, they will get a deeper impression.

Unfortunately, most dissatisfied customers leave without saying anything, and do not give you the chance to solve problems and retain their loyalty at all.

Therefore, a major goal of all customer services is to make customers complain more easily.

A "sensitive analysis" table of the US technical assistance research project calculates the impact of customer service projects on profits (Table 1).

The table shows that the company lost 63590 single sales due to inferior product quality and service.

Through project A to reduce the problem, the company recovered 5888 single sales.

Project B not only avoided problems, but also solved more problems and received more customer complaints.

For example, a 800 free customer service phone makes customer complaints more convenient, and at the same time is equipped with a customer complaint handling system.

As a result, project B saved 27693 single sales.

Understanding customer expectations

What are the needs and expectations of customers?

Effective ways are needed to get in-depth information from customers.

It is not enough to believe in slogans such as "customers are always right" or to let employees' chest sign "yes, I can".

To build customer loyalty, there must be a strategy that helps you understand and meet customer needs and expectations.

One of these strategies is to find ways to see your company through customers' eyes.

First take a questionnaire and then dress up as a customer.

Does the format of the questionnaire allow you to describe your experience?

It is not always good enough for customers to choose from the questionnaire.

Besides, did you leave room for customers to write down their opinions?

Another idea is to invite a customer to speak at the next meeting.

It is more effective to listen to good words and bad words from customers than to display charts by marketers.

When you are in contact with customers, you may as well ask: if there is a thing you want to see that we change, then this is...

Verhauser is an American timber company, which requires its employees to spend a week working for their customers.

Transportation managers load and unload goods at the terminals, while accountants act as customer service representatives of retail centers.

Their purpose is to listen, understand and acquire in-depth information about how to improve our company's work.

This is undoubtedly a creative method of investigation.

Another strategy of customer loyalty construction is to redefine the expectations of customers for outstanding quality.

That is to say, we should not only satisfy expectations, but also exceed expectations. We need to provide a unique service or product that can be remembered.

American big business product companies give small gifts to customers who have to wait for service to express their apology for delay service.

Other companies create customer loyalty through establishing a partnership between customers and enterprises.

Once possible, individualization, or even customization of services, to show customers that they have found a partner who understands and cares for them.

Let customer service become the top priority of everyone.

Is customer service priority in the company?

It is necessary to implant a culture of customer service for your company.

Remember that you are an example.

If managers do not practice, it will not be effective to send employees to customer service training.

A concept of respectful treatment of customers should be established.

If there are any problems in teaching staff, they should first assume that the error is in the company itself rather than on the customers.

Develop proactive policies to let customers know if there are any problems with their orders and not wait until the last minute to tell customers.

Discuss customer satisfaction at staff meetings, giving good and bad examples.

Remind employees of your concerns about customer service.

We should solicit customer feedback and turn customer satisfaction into a part of employee performance appraisal.

Clear the corresponding expectations and minimum customer service standards, and specific in place.

For example, incoming calls should be answered within 2 rings. Visitors must wait in 30 seconds.

Effective response will surprise customers.

What if customers are dissatisfied?

Large and medium sized enterprises have been rehabilitate with different customers to solve the problem of service.

In the face of dissatisfied customers, SMEs can take the following 6 steps to carry out service rehabilitation:

The first step is to apologize and admit the inconvenience that customers have experienced.

A simple apology does not cost much, but it is a powerful first step in retaining customer loyalty.

Self apologizing is more effective than mechanical standard apology.

The second step is to listen, empathize and ask some questions about the beginning.

Angry customers often look for a good listener who shows their true feelings to their experiences.

The third step is to propose a fair solution to the problem.

Once employees respond to problems in a sensible way, they must deal with them from the basic problems.

At this stage, customers must feel that their employees have the power and skills to deal with problems.

What customers want is action, not just empty words.

The fourth step is to give customers some additional compensation for the inconvenience or injury.

Customer meeting