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Retaining The Customer

Retaining existing customers is important for business success. The document provides helpful hints for customer retention: 1) Address dissatisfied customers first to improve service and win them back. 2) Regularly ask customers about satisfaction to preempt issues. 3) Understand customers' perspectives to build empathy and resolve issues effectively. 4) Empower customer-facing staff to resolve issues independently to satisfy customers. 5) Proactively monitor for dissatisfaction and respond quickly to retain customers rather than regain lost ones.

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52 views

Retaining The Customer

Retaining existing customers is important for business success. The document provides helpful hints for customer retention: 1) Address dissatisfied customers first to improve service and win them back. 2) Regularly ask customers about satisfaction to preempt issues. 3) Understand customers' perspectives to build empathy and resolve issues effectively. 4) Empower customer-facing staff to resolve issues independently to satisfy customers. 5) Proactively monitor for dissatisfaction and respond quickly to retain customers rather than regain lost ones.

Uploaded by

Mikhail
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Retaining the Customer - Helpful Hints

Selling is not only the act of gaining new customers. A successful company must retain
and grow the customers they already have. Here are some helpful hints.

1. Start your customer relationship efforts with those of your customers who are so
dissatisfied that they have either abandoned you or are considering doing so. These
customers offer the clearest indication of where you need improvement and how you can
improve. They also offer the opportunity to win them back by showing you care.

2. Ask your customers on a regular basis how they feel about your product or service.
Not only will they appreciate your concern and interest, but also you will be pre-empting
any negative feedback they may have. Keep in mind that about 95% of unhappy
customers do not complain to someone who can remedy the problem. Yet many
unhappy customers share their displeasure with up to 20 people. Scheduling satisfaction
inquiries gives you a chance to make good on a problem before damage is done to your
account, and your reputation.

3. The key to making an unhappy customer happy begins with expressing an


understanding of how that person feels. Showing empathy - the identification with the
thoughts or feelings of another - is critical. Apologizing without showing you understand
is useless. Fixing the problem without understanding is also less effective. First
acknowledge and understand how the other person feels. Then your apology will seem
sincere. And your remedy will seem genuine.

4. Empower your customer sales personnel to make decisions. Give them guidelines to
follow, but let them complete the interaction with the customer to that customer's
satisfaction. Significantly more often than not your employee will make the right
decisions and leave your customers happy. Nothing bothers a customer more than being
told by a customer relations representative that he or she can't be of assistance or needs
to speak with his or her supervisor. Give them the ability to resolve issues as they arise.
That's what you hired them for.

5. It's always easier to retain a customer than it is to gain a new one, and it's much
easier to retain a customer than it is to regain one that has left. This means you must
make every effort to detect dissatisfaction among customers before they make the
decision to move to one of your competitors. Your company should make use of CRM
technology, but if you are too small to institute enterprise-wide software, implement a
system that will alert when accounts show unusual changes. Determine the pattern of
your customers and proactively respond to their issues.

6. Customers will leave you if they get a sense that you are indifferent. You need to
create schedules of contact, sending regular notices, telephone calls and emails. These
should not be sales calls, but rather unobtrusive exchanges just letting the client know
you care.
7. Approach customer concerns with an eye toward resolution. Work hard to solve
customer challenges with your product. Open your dialogue by seeing what you can do
to help, and use that as a springboard to see where else you can be of service.

8. Call your own company from time to time and go through the customer relations
process. Are you satisfied with the time it takes, the replies you are getting and the
remedy offered? If you're not, certainly your customers aren't either.
9. Retaining customers means growing with them, continuing to meet their needs. You
need to keep your pulse on your industry and your customer needs and make sure that
you continue to offer the best solution and best value available.

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