If you’ve got a mix of great branding and great customer support going along with a business that caters to its market, then you should hopefully be at the point where you have a base of consumers you can rely on.
Too many businesses ignore their loyal customers to instead focus on new options. However, if you’re willing to make that loyalty the core of your next few moves, your business could stand to benefit even more from it. “Good marketing makes the company look smart. Great marketing makes the customer feel smart.” says Joe Chernov, VP of Marketing @InsightSquared.
Keep in touch
There are very few reasons not to keep reaching out to those who already use your products and services. First, you want to make sure that they know their opinions are being heard, by asking them to take part in surveys and to simply offer feedback when they can. Nowadays, many businesses use social media, but to strengthen that connection with your customers, you shouldn’t just use it to deliver content.
You should use it to reply to what your consumers are saying and to retweet and show off what they’re saying, whether it’s in support of your brand or even an otherwise entertaining message. It shows off the human side of the business and gets them involved, turning them into community members, not just consumers.
Use that loyalty to bring in new customers
Sometimes, a customer’s loyalty or love of a brand gets to a point where it becomes an obvious factor to those who know them. If your brand has that kind of visibility built into it, then it’s a good idea to capitalize on it. In lifestyle and fashion brands, for instance, it’s become common and very lucrative for brands to use custom gift cards.
The benefit of using such cards is two-fold. Not only do you reinforce that brand connection with an existing customer. You also make it with a new customer, the one buying the gift card. Particularly in the holiday seasons, this can be an inexpensive yet hugely effective way to spread out your income options.
Reward customers for choosing you over your competitors
There is always something extra you can offer you new customers when they sigh up or refer another client to sign up for your product. You could put together a free educational resource package about your industry or open up an extra feature. You can also introduce a customer care program to reward your loyal customers.
Get some incentivization going
If your brand attracts repeat customers well, then that’s a strength you should use, too. What better way than to support that repeat custom and even offer a reward for it? Loyalty systems work best when they have real, intrinsic value to them. Not only can you use them to offer savings on future purchases.
You should consider, especially in ecommerce, using them to offer bigger savings particularly on the items that you would recommend to specific customers using their past purchase history.
If you have the opportunity, you should even consider partnering with other companies to include them in your loyalty program. That could potentially double the incentive to become a member in the first place.
It’s all too easy to see the benefits of reaching out to new consumers, but it could be even easier to retain those you’ve already won over. Do it right with the tips above and you could end up turning a loyal base of customers into a devoted legion of fans.