Editor’s note: This article was first published in October 2010. Its example of Emilio Botín, then chairman of Banco Santander, as a customer a bank treats differently reflects that time; Botín died in 2014.
Many entrepreneurs and business owners find that their Achilles’ heel is sales and winning customers, but they forget that the hardest part is not winning the customer. That can be achieved with the right marketing. What really matters, once you have won a customer, is keeping them loyal, and how to build that loyalty is something most businesses tend to overlook. Here are some tips and ideas on how to build customer loyalty.
Always remember this: “A customer is not won in 5 minutes, but can be lost in 60 seconds.” The first and most important thing we need to learn in our business is the meaning of the word “empathy”.
1. Empathy with the customer
Try to look at your company from your customer’s point of view. Put yourself in their shoes and think the way they do. Try to work out what they would like to find in your company, your business, your product or service and, above all, tailor your service to each particular customer.
Not all customers are the same or need the same attention, just as each customer has different solvency and liquidity. Not everyone pays in cash and, above all, not everyone pays within the same period, so discounts will vary depending on the type of customer, just as our attention should vary from one customer to another.
I know it will sound somewhat materialistic, but we see it every day at the bank. Emilio Botín is not served in the same way as an ordinary person. Like it or not, that is how business works.
2. Always negotiate for the long term
There is no point in winning a sale today and losing a customer who could have kept coming back. Remember that to earn a lot in the long term, sometimes (only sometimes) we have to lose, or earn less, in the short term. Build your customers’ loyalty with prices that set you apart from your competitors and, above all, and always more important than price, with excellent quality in your product or service.
See also: How to come up with business ideas
3. Ongoing attention
If you have good customers who have been buying from you for months without you having to visit them, do not make the mistake of thinking you do not need to see them or look after them personally. Reward your good customers in some way, and you will not leave an opening for a better offer from your competitors. In business, it is not all about price and quality. Attention and a good customer–supplier relationship are what set you apart from the competition.
4. Train your employees
We take it for granted that an office administrator or a receptionist knows how to treat customers properly and, as a rule, they are not trained in “personalized customer service”, so when we are not there we may be leaving a gap in communication between the customer and the company. Always train your employees. As Henry Ford is supposed to have said, the only thing more expensive than training an employee who then leaves is not training them and letting them stay in your company.
5. Listen to your customers
Listening to your customers and their needs is the best way to improve your company. Make them part of your project and involve them as much as you can. Try to make them feel they are an important part of the company. Everyone wants to feel like an important piece of something, wants to be heard and wants to think that others take their experience into account. It is exactly the same with customers.
Remember: if looking for customers and making sales is a vitally important task, keeping your customer base loyal is a necessity for every business owner. In the long run, loyal customers build you a new customer base thanks to word of mouth, or “viral marketing”.
Further reading
- How to attract the first customers to your business
- Tips for choosing a partner for your company
- How to improve your company in a few simple steps
- How to improve your business’s sales in 3 simple steps
- The mindset of an entrepreneur
Featured image: Moritz Zimmermann, CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons.
