How to Increase Your Customer Retention Rates

Listen to Customer and Employee Feedback

Improved customer and employee communication can significantly increase your company retention rates. Listening to feedback from your customers and staff members, gives a better idea of how to improve your business.

Whether it’s a customer’s buying experience, or an employee’s views on their working environment, such information can prove invaluable to boosting retention rates.

Obtaining feedback is just a matter of providing some easy ways for people to respond, such as a quick email survey or an online poll. The most important thing to remember here is to make giving feedback both convenient and worth your audience’s time. So make your methods as accessible and beneficiary as possible; like providing pre-written responses and offering rewards. Free services like Google Forms and Survey Monkey are a great way to collect feedback from your customers.

Offer Flexible Pricing Models

Ensuring that your customers can always find value in your products and services, is a sure-fire way to increase your retention rates. This often requires businesses to offer more flexible pricing models, that shift and change according to the needs of the market.

Whether you’re responding to an economic slump or a change in seasons, adapting your pricing not only makes your business more competitive, but it also shows a willingness to support your customers.

Consider giving discounts or bundles that offer value to existing customers looking to renew purchases or invest further in your business. Providing good value and offering compromises will encourage customers to stay with you.

Set Customer Expectations Early

Setting realistic, even low expectations amongst customers, can allow your business a greater chance of wowing them. Obviously, you’ll want to present an impressive pitch when selling your products and services, but underselling yourself ever so slightly can create opportunities for exceeding expectations.

Imagine promising a good level of service, only to completely blow customers away with an incredible serving experience instead. By making it seem like your business is going above and beyond what was expected, your customers will be more willing to remain loyal to your company.

Whereas promising your customers the world and more is a dangerous move that could lead to dissatisfaction and disappointment. Not being able to deliver on your promises is a quick way to lose customers to your competitors.

Be Proactive

Getting ahead of the game and serving your customers’ needs before they arise, can help significantly increase your business’s retention rates. By anticipating how to provide for your customers in advance, you’ll be able to surprise them with a level of attentiveness they may not expect.

Offering support without being prompted, or showing an interest out of the blue, can seriously impress your customers. Try creating a system wherein your employees contact customers to enquire after their situation, or follow-up after an interaction to ask if there’s anything else you can do. This is an especially good system for appeasing customers asking after members of staff that aren’t currently available, as it shows that your business is doing all it can regardless of setbacks.

Consider even using collaboration software such as a CRM like SalesForce or Pipeline, to help predict which customers might have what needs. This will allow you to be more on the ball when it comes to having a more proactive approach towards serving your customers. Unexpected help is always the best help, and your customers will thank you for it with loyalty.

Be a Trusted Adviser

Showing your customers that your business and its employees can be trusted to know what they’re talking about, can help hold their loyalty for longer. Making your customers aware of your company’s expertise, can give them the assurance that you’re the business to stick with.

A great way to do this is to offer useful advice on subjects relating to your industry; for example, if your business sells double glazing, then you could provide further advice on how to retain heat in the home.

Maintaining a regular blog or sending email newsletters, are both great ways to provide your customers with helpful advice. Not only does this prove your company has expertise, but it also creates more ways for customers to view your website and services.

Giving free and easy advice is a fantastic way of giving something back to your customers, and increasing your retention rates.

Keeping customers is as important as finding new ones, so improving your retention rates is essential to the success of your business. For more advice; learn how unified communications can help your business to provide better customer service.