Knowing your customers

Is customer loyalty more important than attracting new customers? Loyal customers are important, but so is attracting new customers. It is a delicate balance that can be difficult to strike. If you do not advertise your products to new customers, your business will not grow. And if you do not treat your current customers well, you may lose them.

1. How can you attract first custom?

Obviously, it’s important to spend some effort on acquiring new customers, especially when you first launch a business. To attract new customers, you can offer special promotions or discounts to encourage them to try your product or service.

If you’re selling online, you’ll have to have a website, but that’s not the end of it. You need to be thinking about how your customer will find you and what they will do when they find you. That means you need to think about SEO (Search Engine Optimization), PPC (Pay-Per-Click) and social media channels like Facebook and Twitter.

The best way to reach new customers is to find out where they are, and then go to them. That is why it is so important to know where your potential customers hang out online.

It is important that the ads you use are relevant to what you are selling. If you sell sports cars and you use an ad that shows a family of four in a minivan, people will not be interested!

If you are in a highly competitive market, you might have to offer your product or service at a lower price than your competitors to attract new customers. However, be careful that your business does not undercut its own profitability. If you charge less than the cost of producing your product or service, you could find yourself making a loss.

The following strategies will help you attract new customers:

• Offer quality products. Good quality is the most important reason cited by consumers for buying directly from farmers. Quality is also a reason given by consumers for buying directly from retailers. When you make sure that your products are high quality, it will keep your customers coming back to you.

• Offer a variety of products. If your product line is too narrow, customers will not have enough reasons to buy from you. This is especially important if you sell goods or services that are not aimed at a specific niche market. The more goods and services you offer, the greater the chance that your customers will find something they like.

• Offer convenience. If it’s inconvenient for them to shop at your store, or if it’s inconvenient for them to buy things from you in some other way, they are likely to go elsewhere.

• Give good customer service. Customers want to feel good when they shop with you. They want to feel special, and they want to feel important. They want to know that you really appreciate their business, and that you care about them and about their needs.

• Give value for money. Selling your products at a low price is not enough. You also have to give value for money, meaning the customer should get more than the price they paid. For example, if you are selling a product, give detailed information about how to use it and how to maintain it. If you are selling a service, give more than the minimum required service. Give more attention than other similar businesses give their customers.

• Pay attention to your customers’ needs. Find out what they need, and then provide it. If they need advice or information, give it to them. If they need some kind of service, provide it for them.

2. How to keep your customers loyal?

Contrary to what many entrepreneurs think, customer loyalty and retention are far more valuable to a small- or medium-sized business than new customer acquisition. Customer acquisition is expensive.

Loyalty between customers and businesses may take time to develop, but it can be much more valuable in the long run than attracting new customers. Because of this, many companies focus on maintaining relationships with their current customers. They do things like reward customers who refer to their friends, offer exclusive or personalized items and services, and provide great customer service.

Customer loyalty comes from having good customer service, making sure the products and services that you provide are of the highest quality, and being a worthy investment for your customers. Loyal customers are likely to return and refer your business to others.

The secret to keeping customers loyal is to treat them well. That means providing good customer service and responding quickly to any problems. You should also be consistent and reliable. If you promise to deliver something by a certain date, you should do it.

You will want to give your customers incentives to buy more from you. One way is to offer frequent buyer discounts, for example, 10% off on their next purchase after they have bought five times from you. Another way is to offer a loyalty program where if they spend X amount of money with you they get a certain amount of discount or free product. You can also send them a newsletter with special offers and other information about your business.

You’ll want to create multiple streams of revenue. That way, if one source dries up, you have others to fall back on. One way to do this is to offer complementary products and services that can be sold together. This is a cross-selling strategy. For example, if you sell automotive parts online you can offer car repair tips and maintenance videos as well as how-to videos for installing the parts.

Are your customers your friends? They can make or break your company, so the answer is yes! Building a close relationship with your customers is key to making them loyal. Good customer service will keep them coming back for more of your product, and they will tell their friends and family about it too. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you don’t need to give your customers what they want because they keep coming back anyway.

But is that really a good thing? That’s like thinking you can just complete your school assignments by copying off the person sitting next to you. Sure it may get you by, but you’ll never stand out from the crowd.

On the other hand, imagine how much easier your school life would have been if you could get an A+ on every assignment! Like in school, customer service is all about learning from your mistakes and doing what it takes to succeed. The more you interact with your customers, the better you’ll get at understanding them and their needs. In this way, your customers can actually become your friends.

3. Focus on buyer persona:

If you want to develop a product or service that appeals to a large audience, it pays to think like your ideal customer. To do so you will have to create a persona for your ideal customer. A persona is a description of an ideal customer - the kind of person who would buy your product or service.

A buyer persona is an imaginary representation of your ideal customer. It is a fictional character created to represent the specific needs of a target market. It helps marketing teams and companies better understand their customers and how to reach them. Buyer personas are commonly used in marketing, User Experience design, and product development. They help you consider your customers’ needs as you create a new product or service or improve an existing one. They can help you define your target market, create website content, and deliver your message in the most relevant way to your audience.

To create your buyer persona make a list of what they might be like, including their demographics, psychographic and life stage. Analyse their behaviour patterns, needs and wants, hobbies, and what motivates them. This is an example in the following picture:

Your buyer persona is your target customer and will help you create marketing campaigns that are more likely to succeed. If you know your ideal customer, and their wants and needs, then you can better target them with your messaging. Knowing who they are and what they need also helps you determine how to best market your product to them.

4. What is the customer experience?

The customer experience means how your customers feel during every step of their interaction with your business. They could be looking at your website, reading your brochure or talking on the telephone to one of your staff. The customer experience can be broken down into three steps:

The customer experience begins with customer awareness. Your customer has to be aware of your business and what you are selling. They have to know who you are and what you do. This is where the marketing comes in. You have to get your message out there.

The second step is the customer contact. That has to do with when your customer has made their first contact with your business. Will they be able to find what they are looking for? Will they be able to find the information they need? Will they be able to find someone that can help them?

The final step is customer satisfaction. It’s about whether your customers enjoy their experience with you and whether they feel that you have met their expectations. Have you given them what they wanted? Have you been helpful and friendly? Are they happy to recommend you to their friends?

Understanding the customer experience is important because it helps business owners to understand their customers. It also helps them to improve the way they do things and to deliver a better service, which can lead to increased sales, greater customer loyalty and an improved bottom line.

How can you improve the customer experience? The customer experience can be improved by:

• Understanding the customer: What is important to them? What do they want? How are they feeling? What do they need?

• Listening to the customer: what do you need to know about them? What do they say about you and your business? What things do they like and dislike about your service, products and staff?

• Understanding the market: awareness of what your competitors are doing, keeping up-to-date with developments in the marketplace and knowing what customers expect.

• Understanding the business: knowing the strengths and weaknesses of the business, identifying opportunities to improve profitability, market share and customer satisfaction.

• Understanding the external environment: changes taking place in society, economic conditions, environmental factors, technological developments, and other influences that may affect a business ability to compete in its marketplace.