How to Evangelize Customers: Beyond the Bottom of the Funnel Posted on April 22, 2016August 12, 2022 by Jessica Lunk The process of gaining customers and generating sales is long and time-consuming – especially for B2B companies with a long sales cycle. By the end of a closed sale, it can be easy for both the sales and marketing teams to figuratively “wash their hands” of the customer and move on to closing the next batch of leads. But there’s a problem with this approach. The problem is that some of the greatest value generated from a customer comes after the close—or beyond the funnel. Entrepreneur and business leader Rory Vaden explains it like this in his article, The 7 Stage Customer Evangelism Lifecycle: You don’t need customers who are pleased with their experience and so they tell no one. That’s neutral and neutral is negative. What you need is customers who are so on fire about what you have provided to them that they have no choice but to take to social media and spread the positive love to all of their friends in the same way they would tell them about a great movie. Here’s how sales and marketing professionals can create go beyond the funnel to evangelize customers and boost revenue: Provide Excellent Customer Service It may be obvious, but the first step to evangelizing customers is to provide great customer service. Customers are much more likely to come back if they enjoyed their purchasing experience – that’s a no-brainer. After they have purchased, however, there is even more you can do to bring them back for future purchases: Offer special discounts: Your customer’s purchase history indicates which products and services they are most interested in. Email customers when the things they normally purchase from you are on sale or in season, or reach out to customers when their renewal or anniversary date comes up. Reward their loyalty to your business with special customer-only discounts or perks. Follow-up: A follow-up call or email ensures that everything went well with their first purchase and gives your business the opportunity to nip and issues in the bud before your customer turns to social media to voice any frustrations. Following up also keeps your brand top of mind and reinforces your relationship with the customer. Survey: It’s easy to develop products and services in a vacuum, but you don’t know for sure how they will be received until you listen to your customers. Collecting anonymous survey data can help you pin-point areas you can improve to make the customer experience better. Taking time to listen to customer feedback can turn one-time purchases into repeat business and referrals when your customers tell their friends and connections about their exceptional experience. Generate Customer Referrals Acquiring a new customer takes a lot of time, money and hard work. That’s why customer referrals are so important to your business. Consumers are much more likely to invest in products and services when a peer makes a recommendation – here’s how to boost your customer referrals: Ask for referrals directly: Getting referrals can be as easy as asking a question. After speaking with happy customers, a member of your team can simply ask the question, “would you recommend our product to others?” The worst they could say is “no.” If they answer, ask them who you could call about the product. You can also create a simple email that asks your satisfied customers for referrals – after all, sometimes the happiest customers are the ones you never hear from. Keep a list of references: Sometimes a reference from a happy customer is the final incentive a prospect needs to do business with you. Ask your happy customers if they would be willing to be a reference so you have a running list of folks you can reach out to and a moment’s notice. Try to build a list that includes references from each vertical – for instance, try to have a reference in each industry you serve so you can tailor the reference to the prospect’s unique perspective. Collect testimonials and reviews: A simple email campaign to satisfied customers can help you gather testimonials for your website or reviews for industry review sites. Tip: Don’t bombard your customers with too many asks at once – they’ll get burnt out. Track your communication so you’re only reaching out quarterly or yearly. Tap into social media: Peer-to-peer referrals are most widely generated by social media. Reward your customers for tweeting or posting about their experience to their social network. Using social media networks, you target your customers’ acquaintances or partner-companies and offer the same results you gave your customers. Make sure it’s easy to share your message. This includes social share buttons on your website and in your emails. When it comes to post-close success, the greatest achievement you can make is to create product evangelists out of your customers. These customers will actively invite others around them, whether in person or online, to try out your product. They become mini-salespeople and also your most valuable relationships. A successful sale takes work. An evangelized customer takes even more work, but the rewards are well worth it. Apply the principles above to ensure your customers keeping giving you value well beyond the bottom of the funnel.
5 Clever Ways to Reward Your Customers Posted on January 26, 2016November 3, 2022 by Erin Posey Studies repeatedly show that customers want to be rewarded for their loyalty, and those rewards just make them more loyal to the business. A study by Manta and BIA/Kelsey, “Achieving Big Customer Loyalty in a Small Business World,” found that 64% of businesses with a customer loyalty program in place report it has been been effective– it makes more money than it costs to maintain. There are other benefits too. Customers that feel appreciated are far more likely to talk positively about your company and recommend it to their friends. And rewarding your customers incentivizes them to make additional purchases. That Manta report also found that repeat customers spend 67% more on a purchase than a new customer does. More than 60% of small business owners in the study say they generate the majority of their annual revenue from repeat customers. Loyalty programs and rewards points have become the standard in many industries, like airlines, hotels and restaurants, even fitness centers. But as a small business owner, you have the flexibility (and lack of bureaucracy) to take the road less traveled and reward your best customers in clever, unusual ways. Doing things differently than big companies will both engender your customers’ loyalty and give your business more cachet. Here are five clever ways to reward your customers: Partner up. Team up with other, complimentary businesses to offer gifts or reciprocal discounts. An example might be a sports clothing and accessory shop that offers a discounted membership at the local gym when a customer spends above a certain threshold. Or it could be a coffee shop that teams up with a bakery or chocolatier to offer a discount on a purchase, which also pair nicely with a cup of coffee. The partnership will be good for both businesses, incentivizing sales and giving customers of both shops a reason to try the other’s products. Hang out with them. Whether you’re a local business or you have a national presence—virtually or in reality—try to meet with your customers every month. If you can, every time you’re traveling (or one of your managers is traveling), look up customers that live in the area and offer to buy them a coffee. Hold a preview event. Create an event around a new product, a new service offering, even just an update to your software and invite your best customers to preview it and have a first crack at ordering it. You want this event to feel special and exclusive, so make the ambiance and refreshments elegant and make sure there’s ample time and room for customers to mingle with both one another, you and your staff, and to learn about the new offering. Offer your best customers your best service. For small businesses especially, sometimes a few heavy-hitting customers make up a large portion of the business’ revenue. But even if you have several very loyal and consistent customers you want to make sure you keep, offer them preferential service terms. That doesn’t just mean a good price. You could waive minimum order quantity or certain service fees, you might give them a lower interest rate for financing a large purchase or provide an after-hours service call to them. A great deal for certain customers may mean more hand-holding to help them understand how to make full use of your products and services. And sometimes, yeah, you give them a discount on the price of a large order. Write a thank you note. Yes, a real, hand-written note on a pretty card that uses your customer’s name and references recent purchases and the name of their business. Hand-written notes are so rare now they’re special, so writing a specific, personal note to a great customer is a meaningful way to let them know how much they are appreciated. These are just a few ways to reach out to your customers to show your appreciation. What are some ways you’ve went above and beyond to wow and delight your loyal customers? Let us know over on Facebook and be sure to give us a ‘Like’ while you’re there!
Cultivate Sales With Customer Service: How To Sell More To Your Best Customers Posted on January 11, 2016July 22, 2022 by Jessica Lunk No matter what industry you’re in, as long as you have customers, you’re also in the service industry. And it’s been well documented that improving customer service increases sales and, ultimately, profits. A survey by American Express found that two-thirds of consumers are willing to spend more at a company they believe provides excellent customer service; three out of four said they spend more with companies where they have a history of positive customer service experiences. It’s also much easier to sell products and services to existing customers as opposed to new ones, with whom you have no track record. So take good care of your current customers and pay attention to their needs; if they like your products or services chances are they will buy others from you too. Existing customers are the most cost-efficient sales targets for a small business because they spend more and refer others. At the same time, all customers are not the same. Some add more long-term value to your business than others. If you want to sell more to existing customers it makes sense to start with your very best customers. Here’s how to identify who they are and build a solid and profitable relationship with them: Your best customers aren’t necessarily the ones who buy the most. If you rank your customers’ importance by the amount of stuff they buy, you’re leaving out some critical information—namely, how much it costs to sell to them. A customer might provide a good deal of revenue but the cost to actually make a sale (the time, the hand-holding) may exceed the value of that sale. A customer may be valuable to you because of when they buy, not how much. If your business is seasonal or cyclic and there are months–or entire quarters–that are generally slower, a customer that buys regularly during off-peak times is important, filling in your revenue gaps. Better yet, if the customer loves your business and is vocal about it–sharing that love on social media, in Yelp reviews and by referring others—that’s enormously valuable to you in terms of marketing. Be available. Once you identify your most valuable clients make sure you are available to them when they need you. As a small business, you’re in a position that larger vendors aren’t – you’re nimble and flexible enough to respond quickly. If one of your best customers needs a rush job at the last minute, for instance, you can scramble, moving people and resources around to accommodate the request without having to deal with a bureaucratic, multi-layered approval process. Understand what your customer is up against. Cultivate a strong relationship with your best customers by learning about their business—what kind of competition they face, their cost pressures, as well as their immediate and longer-term concerns. Knowing—or even better, anticipating—their needs will allow you to offer them relevant and helpful products and services. Nurture relationships. The best way to do that is with a customer relationship management system–a CRM–which lets you put all your customer data in one place—their contact information, interests, transaction and spending history, payment history, response to marketing materials and, perhaps most important, their history of communication. Looking at that data will help you tailor products and services to their needs, and to show an interest in their business and their challenges. Every contact is a chance to improve and build that relationship, which will allow you to sell more to that customer and get them to refer others to you.