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How to take advantage of customer engagement and word-of-mouth advertising.
It’s a dilemma. It’s not just about customer service leading to the point of sale and after. Yes, you’ve got to be concerned about giving great service after the sale and the impact of your customers on social media.
So you have to enhance and manage your customer relationships.
How?
Better business performance results when CEOs show leadership in providing the best-possible customer experience.
Confirmed in a global study, companies profit most by investing in customer engagement.
6 Effective Tips for Getting to Know Your Customers
Establishing a customer relationship is crucial to a brand’s success. Learn how to effectively connect with your audience using these tips.
A business is nothing without its customers — that’s why establishing relationships with your customer base is crucial to your business’s success. Brands that build relationships with their customers will find that consumers appreciate having their concerns and needs acknowledged, adding a personal touch to the customer’s experience with the brand.
Here are six ways to get to know your customers better.
Be active on social media
Social media is a great tool for conducting market research, learning more about your audience, and establishing and growing your brand’s reputation. By opening the lines of communication via social media and providing valuable content to your audience, customers can get to know your brand in a more intimate and personal way, which can lead to increased customer engagement.
Brands can grow their social media audience by acting as thought leaders online for their industry, sharing their knowledge and resources that may be valuable to target consumers. This can, in turn, attract new customers and foster deeper relationships with existing ones.
[Read: 6 Winning (and Adaptable) Customer Acquisition Strategies From Growing Brands]
What can membership do for your business?
Gain tools to stay informed, competitive, and connected by becoming a U.S. Chamber of Commerce member. Membership gives you direct access to expert policy insights, economic updates, and exclusive resources designed to help your business thrive. From behind-the-scenes analysis from D.C. to exclusive discounts and expert support, U.S. Chamber membership helps you navigate change and seize new opportunities.
Create a survey
Conducting surveys is an effective method for learning about customers’ preferences regarding the products or services. Through a series of targeted questions, brands can discover their customers’ likes and dislikes and determine how their audience is receiving their offerings. This information can then guide product/service development in a way that better serves their target audience’s needs.
You can conduct surveys online in various ways, including free offerings, such as SurveyMonkey and Typeform, or through polling features on social media. Brands can also conduct surveys in person or at the point of purchase. Regardless of how it’s conducted, a survey can effectively make customers feel as though they have a voice in the product/service, leading to a closer connection to your brand.
Host an event
Modern-day customers are not only looking for personalized content/messaging but also for personalized experiences. Customers want to support brands that provide value to them and care about their individual needs. Hosting an event is a great way to demonstrate your brand’s value, promote its identity, and gain traction with new audiences.
Hold classes, workshops, webinars, or an open forum either online or in person, and create space for customers to ask questions. Doing so will allow your customers to become acquainted with and interact with your brand face-to-face, learning more about your products or services, as well as your company mission and values, which can win them over.
Plus, hosting events offers cross-promotional opportunities for businesses, as they can partner with other businesses to grow their customer base and strengthen ties with other entrepreneurs in their community.
Customers want to feel appreciated, as an individual, and they want to know that their business matters.
Read and respond to positive and negative reviews
Businesses should read and respond to reviews promptly to understand how consumers view their business. Reviews — both positive and negative — help businesses understand the customer experience and uncover shortcomings that may be hindering its success they are not aware of. Additionally, customer reviews highlight what the brand is doing right that customers would like to see more of.
Responding to reviews humanizes your brand, builds trust, and demonstrates your commitment to offering the best experience possible to customers; however, brands should ensure their responses are professional, well-written, and respectful. Poorly written or rude responses negatively impact business, damage your reputation, and hurt relationships with customers.
[Read: Customer Complaints: 5 Tips for Handling Unsatisfied Clients]
Start a conversation
Talking to customers is a direct, yet effective way to get to know them and make them feel valued. By connecting with customers through conversation — be it in person or via social media — brands can reach their audience to learn valuable information that can be used to improve the business.
Promoting user-generated content can add to the conversation, as consumers respond strongly to other customers’ experiences. According to Bizrate Insights, 54.7% of customers read a minimum of four reviews before purchasing a product. Having customer buy-in engenders credibility and trust within a brand, and consumers are more likely to feel confident purchasing from you even if it’s their first time buying your goods or services based on the positive reviews of others.
Personalize deals and discounts
Offering personalized deals and discounts, such as birthday and anniversary discounts, loyalty programs, and deals based on prior purchases, can attract your target audience and keep customers returning. Customers want to feel appreciated, as an individual, and they want to know that their business matters — you can achieve these aims by providing a personalized experience and tailoring promotions to suit your audience’s needs.
Personalization can also help brands highlight the products/services customers value most, making consumers feel understood rather than just being another number to the business. By finding ways to reach customers on a personal level, you can boost your sales and customer engagement.
You can begin by taking advantage of customer feedback. So you have to ask them their opinions by starting a conversation.
By engaging your customers, it will sustain your business for the future. You’ll learn valuable perspectives.
Customers might not be buying from you for the emotional reasons you think. Remember, all buying decisions are based on emotion – the intrinsic value customers perceive about your offerings.
They might have practical utilitarian reasons for buying gadgets or they might buy products for talking points with visitors to their homes to show how hip they are.
Other insights
Another benefit of customer engagement: You’ll get insights on what else to put in your inventory and how you can best show your appreciation for their patronage.
If you’re not a great steward of your current book of business, it’s futile to look for new customers.
The quickest way for established businesses to optimize revenue is to have a stellar customer-loyalty program for repeat sales and referrals. So take steps to energize your customer-loyalty program.
Incidentally, the fourth quarter is particularly challenging for restaurants. Their revenue has been plummeting after Thanksgiving – as high as 45 percent.
So, restaurant owners must double-down on customer loyalty strategies to improve sales in Q4.
After all, you should be focused on five elements:
- Provide stellar customer service
- When you’re making a sale and especially for expensive products, make your customer feel appreciated with a sincere thank you (don’t merely say “have a nice day”)
- Obtain customer feedback
- Brand with salient messages of value
- Encourage word-of-mouth advertising to attract and keep customers
Despite all the emphasis on speed in customer service, it’s not the salient factor in keeping customers happy. It’s important to understand customers’ emotions.
It’s a worthy investment of your resources in time, energy and money.
Customer feedback
Customers are delighted to give you feedback. If you get it, it will positively affect your product and service research, development, and innovation.
Here are four key questions to ask:
- Why did you make this purchase?
- What value are you getting?
- What do you like or dislike about it?
- What other products and services would you appreciate?
Admittedly, the questions aren’t complex market research. They’re questions to generate qualitative answers. What you need immediately for growth is qualitative information, not quantitative.
Up next is quantitative data in the form of answers from customers on your Web site, customer surveys and questionnaires.
From the Coach’s Corner, here are related articles:
Tech Checklist to Provide the Best Customer Support — Ever wonder why big chains – from quick-service restaurants to electronic products – print invitations on sales receipts to entice customers to go the companies’ Web sites to comment online? They’re doing it for customer engagement. Businesses need insights on how they’re faring with customers.
14 Tips to Profit from Online Customer Reviews — For competitiveness and profits, businesses can’t afford to ignore the potential of online reviews. They’re a factor in revolutionizing commerce.
How Retailers Can Improve Operations for Profits — Many retailers could turn their operations into higher profits, if they do a better job of utilizing their customers’ data according to a study. That includes adequately learning insights by better engaging their employees who deal with customers on a regular basis.
Marketing Tips via Mobile Devices, Reviews, Coupons — Digital marketing opportunities keep growing and growing. For instance, 70 percent of consumers research product reviews while they shop in stores. Ninety percent are relying on their mobile devices as they make in-store buying decisions.
“Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.”
-Bill Gates
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