A beginner's guide to customer communication and retention blog

Small and large businesses getting customers is only part of the process. In order to keep your business growing, it's imperative to have an excellent customer experience as well as a customer communication strategy.

It's true that maintaining a positive customer experience can have the ability to have a significant impact on your business. As an example, a five percent increase in retention correlates with at minimum a 25 percent increase in profit ( Bain & Company). The process of keeping customers for a long time could bring additional profit to businesses however losing them can reduce profits. A report from Forbes reported that companies loss of more than $75 billion revenue due to poor customer care in 2018.

How do you get started? In this article we'll look at the importance of customer communication and a few strategies for implementing great communication strategies all throughout the journey of a customer.

What is customer communication?

But what happens after an organization has a sale? Depending on the type of products or services you provide you may be able to offer several touch points. They are great communication opportunities to deepen customer relations. Think onboarding communications, product updates and demos review, quarterly, cross-sell or upsell conversations to keep your customers satisfied and interested in your offerings.

How to improve the customers' experience through better communication

1. Start with the right tools

Making better customer-facing communications begins by evaluating the tools available at hand. Do you use a CRM system to handle your customers? How are you prioritizing customers' inquiries once they are into your system? How can you collect and analyze the most important data about your customers? Are you using emails to communicate with customers or have you thought about using texts, chats, conference calls, or videos?

As your business grows it will require a variety of tools and technology that can help you serve clients to ensure they keep coming back.

2. Set expectations

Sometimes, the expectations of customers might not be in line with the product's capabilities. Be sure to be open and honest with your customers. Leverage your product team to be able to articulate the pros and cons, drawbacks, and most crucially, the unique aspects that make your product stand apart!

To help your customers be able to assist them in their needs, record your customers' features and advantages (and make sure you distill the information into small pieces). The documentation should be made available through easily accessible portals such as an online help desk or a customer video library.

Determine a process to share release announcements Best practices, as well as practical tips to make sure your team as well as your clients are on the same page. Follow the plan and remember its significance. Consistent, transparent communication reduces stress and set your customers for success.

3. Know when to leverage an asynchronous connection

It's 3 AM. The customer service team of your company is down. They want to help you solve an issue right now. This could be a recipe for a frightful escalation, but truthfully, it doesn't have to be!

4. Let customers be empowered by enhancing their video library

Your customers are curious about how to use your product and how it can help them succeed. Make sure they know how to utilize your product with a curated library of resources such as an onboarding guide and product demonstrations, as well as user success stories and seminars or classes to increase the knowledge of your customers.

Easy to digest video content will encourage customers to utilize products, embrace new features and functionality, and continue using products for longer periods of time.

5. Follow up

A follow up message is a staple for solid communication with your customers. For example, a customer is just receiving your product -- from a brand relationship perspective, this moment is crucial. Setting up a new customer to be successful can often be as simple as sending out a "how to start" or "best methods" resource.

Are you unsure of the best time you should send your follow-up? Start by listing all the occasions you have the opportunity to contact a client. It could be:

• Right after a purchase
• After an acquisition
• When attempting to solve a technical issue
• Following a release of a product
• Following a milestone for a client

Follow-ups have some other benefits, too. A helpful follow-up can reduce the amount of support calls or deescalate a bad customer encounter. It also shows you care in providing real value, rather than selling and leaving out.

6. Host customer webinars

7. Send personalized messages

A personalized communication is far better than generic or templated email. Take the time to tailor and personalize your communications to current and potential customers.

8. Develop a Customer Advocate Program

It is the most efficient form of marketing. If a customer has been through your product and came off impressed is someone you should be able to engage.

Choose your most active customers or users who are the most powerful and launch a customer advocacy program. Create rewards, incentives such as referral discounts and special experiences such as sharing timeline details, information about new product launches, or other information to make them feel like an insider valued. The aim is to create an advocate community. Be good to your advocates and they'll assist in building your reputation.

9. Create exclusive events for customers

10. Get involved

There are a variety of ways for a brand to have a positive effect on the customer, such as creating excellent products, actively assisting the success of their business, and putting together tools that meet their requirements. But, the most effective way for any company to make a meaningful impact is taking responsibility when something goes wrong.

It could be that a product does not work in the way you expected. Maybe a major industry shift directly impacts the manner in which a business is able to operate. Businesses that take ownership and are determined to get the right decisions will increase customer delight and build loyalty.