As a business owner, you understand the importance of building customer loyalty. But just how important is it?
This statistic says it all: Nearly 80% of consumers won’t consider purchasing from a business unless the brand demonstrates that it cares about its customers.
So, building loyalty in business should be one of your primary goals. But, how do you go about building trust and creating customer loyalty?
We’re here to help.
Keep reading for 10 helpful tips on how to keep customers loyal for years to come.
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Use Technology, But Wisely
When using technology as a business, you must walk a fine line by using enough, without overdoing it.
After all, prompted phone messaging can be great to get customers through the phone lines quickly, but customers can get frustrated when it feels nearly impossible to just talk to a human. This is when technology is too much.
On the other hand, if you don’t adapt to new technology, you run the risk of looking like a company that can’t keep up with the times.
As a result, you might lose out on building a customer base out of new generations that see technology as an integral part of life.
Strike a good balance by implementing an automated customer experience, while remembering to include a human touch in everything you do.
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Communication Is Key
If you don’t hear from a family member or friend in a few weeks, you start to feel disconnected from them. The same thing happens when you don’t communicate with your customers.
While this doesn’t mean you should be sending hourly emails to your distribution lists, it does mean that communication should be part of your customer loyalty strategy.
Communicate via email, social media, and potentially texts (depending on your business) to pass along important information and stay on your customers’ minds.
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Focus on Customer Service
Unfortunately, we’ve all had a bad customer service experience. And, that interaction often stays with us for a while.
Poor customer service can lead to losing customers, and eventually, they’ll spread the word to their family and friends as well.
By making great customer service a priority for your business, you’ll start to foster relationships with your customers, and in turn, garner loyalty from them.
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Offer Loyalty Perks
We all love to feel special and like we’re being recognized. This is why providing loyalty perks to your customers is a great idea.
Consider rewarding customers with a discount when they sign up for your email newsletter. Or, offer a free item after so many purchases. If you don’t sell a physical product, then your perk might be offering special access to an event.
Figure out a way to reward your customers and then enjoy the response you get in return.
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Don’t Forget About Current Customers
We’ve all seen companies offer amazing discounts to get new customers in the door. And, it’s a good strategy. However, it can leave existing customers feeling left out and discarded.
While you don’t want to ignore efforts to find new business, you should also spend time engaging current customers and making sure they know they are also a priority.
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Do What You Say You Will
The fact of the matter is that you’ll never build customer loyalty if your customers feel they can’t trust you.
This means you need to back up your promises with action. If you promise to respond to all inquiries within one business day, you need to make sure you make good on your word.
Once customers know that you’ll fulfill your promises, it’ll be much more likely that they’ll keep coming back.
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Encourage Customer Feedback
When is the last time you reached out to your customers for feedback? You can either solicit comments on social media, send out an email survey, or ask for it in person.
This can give you valuable insight into what you’re getting right and how you can improve.
Once you hear back from your customers, meet with relevant team members, and develop a plan to make adjustments as needed.
When customers feel like you care about what they have to say and it’s reflected in your actions, you’ll be on your way to making them customers for life.
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Always Provide the Best
Are you and your team always doing everything possible to provide the very best products and services to your customers?
If not, it’s ok to admit that there’s room for improvement. Try to empower employees to have the knowledge and capabilities to go above and beyond with every customer they encounter.
Anything you can do to make customers feel valued and like they’re important works wonders in building loyalty. Always providing your very best is a great way to do so.
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Make It Personal
While, as a business owner, it can be easy to think of customers in terms of numbers and data points, remember that they’re people.
By making your interactions more personal, you can form a human-to-human connection with your customers, which increases loyalty.
As a smaller company, you might send out holiday cards or a small gift to show your appreciation. But, bigger companies can get in on this as well.
If you collect birthdays when customers sign up for your email list, send them an automated birthday email with a special offer or even just a note to let them know you’re thinking of them on their special day.
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Operate with Honesty and Transparency
At the end of the day, your business will not always get things right. And, that’s ok, if you own up to it.
By operating with honesty and transparency in everything that you do, your customers will know they can trust you, even if things go wrong.
If your customers feel like you’re not trying to hide things from them, they’ll be more likely to stay loyal, even during hard times.
Loyalty in Business Is Key to Longevity
Now that you know the most important steps in building loyalty in business, you can set your company up for long-term success.
Looking for other business advice to help you stand out from the competition? Browse our other business articles before you go.