Get and Keep Customers
In today's business world competition is fierce and every business needs an edge. One of the questions that I hear most often is "how can I get more customers and keep them?" My response is always the same and I will share it with you in a couple of minutes.
Last week I was consulting with a limousine company in a relatively small town. For five years there had only been a couple of limousine companies within a 75 mile radius and business was good. They were almost always booked, without spending any money on advertising. They had loyal repeat customers and they were profitable.
But that all changed a few months ago when a local manufacturing plant closed its doors. One of the displaced employees decided to start a limousine business in the same town. Now the heat was on...
This new company had a website so my client had to build one too. The new company bought a stretch Hummer so my client thought he needed one too. The big differentiator happened when the new company traded its services for advertising space at a brand new minor league baseball stadium. They had a giant billboard in center field...right in front of 6000 people every night and they didn't pay a dime for it. My client was stunned. He didn't even know that bartering was possible.
When I talked to my client, my questions were these:
What separates you from the competition?
What do you do better, differently, or to add value?
What does your customer look like? (age, occupation, size of family, marital status, etc.)
What type of service is requested most often? (weddings, anniversaries, proms, business trips, etc.)
Do you have an email list or mailing list?
I was amazed to discover that he had no idea what the answers were! Do you know the answers for your business? So you want to know how to get customers and keep them? Here is the solution...get to know who they are and what they want!
Sounds obvious, right? I can't even tell you how many small AND multi-billion dollar companies that I have worked with who do not know the answers. Two years ago when I was the Vice President of Operations for a two billion dollar health insurance company I wanted to upgrade the functionality of our web portal. Most of the Executive team dismissed the idea because we dealt primarily in Medicaid and they thought our members were too poor to have Internet access. So I took my own training and advice and I used the following techniques to prove my point...and get a new web portal for my two million members.
Conduct a survey: This can be as simple as an evaluation form, email or mailer.
Ask for feedback or ideas: Here is a million dollar question you can ask your customers..."if you could improve one thing about my company/department what would that be?"
Segment your Customers: For example, women have different expectations than men. 50 year olds have different expectations than 20 year olds. Segment all of the different categories so you can track satisfaction according to their demographic information or likes/dislikes/requests.
Create a plan for building a relationship: This can be anything from a web community, a thank you gift, referral bonus, birthday coupon, membership rewards, or a value packed newsletter that solves one of their problems.
Last week I was consulting with a limousine company in a relatively small town. For five years there had only been a couple of limousine companies within a 75 mile radius and business was good. They were almost always booked, without spending any money on advertising. They had loyal repeat customers and they were profitable.
But that all changed a few months ago when a local manufacturing plant closed its doors. One of the displaced employees decided to start a limousine business in the same town. Now the heat was on...
This new company had a website so my client had to build one too. The new company bought a stretch Hummer so my client thought he needed one too. The big differentiator happened when the new company traded its services for advertising space at a brand new minor league baseball stadium. They had a giant billboard in center field...right in front of 6000 people every night and they didn't pay a dime for it. My client was stunned. He didn't even know that bartering was possible.
When I talked to my client, my questions were these:
What separates you from the competition?
What do you do better, differently, or to add value?
What does your customer look like? (age, occupation, size of family, marital status, etc.)
What type of service is requested most often? (weddings, anniversaries, proms, business trips, etc.)
Do you have an email list or mailing list?
I was amazed to discover that he had no idea what the answers were! Do you know the answers for your business? So you want to know how to get customers and keep them? Here is the solution...get to know who they are and what they want!
Sounds obvious, right? I can't even tell you how many small AND multi-billion dollar companies that I have worked with who do not know the answers. Two years ago when I was the Vice President of Operations for a two billion dollar health insurance company I wanted to upgrade the functionality of our web portal. Most of the Executive team dismissed the idea because we dealt primarily in Medicaid and they thought our members were too poor to have Internet access. So I took my own training and advice and I used the following techniques to prove my point...and get a new web portal for my two million members.
Conduct a survey: This can be as simple as an evaluation form, email or mailer.
Ask for feedback or ideas: Here is a million dollar question you can ask your customers..."if you could improve one thing about my company/department what would that be?"
Segment your Customers: For example, women have different expectations than men. 50 year olds have different expectations than 20 year olds. Segment all of the different categories so you can track satisfaction according to their demographic information or likes/dislikes/requests.
Create a plan for building a relationship: This can be anything from a web community, a thank you gift, referral bonus, birthday coupon, membership rewards, or a value packed newsletter that solves one of their problems.