Know Your Advantages:
All businesses must ensure that on top of gaining new customers, they maintain existing customers. An ecommerce business has obvious marketing advantages. Customers don’t have to regard store hours or battle long lines. But with physical stores, often located in malls, customers may already be in a purchasing mode as they walk by and are thus likely to buy products. Moreover, these stores can draw in customers with eye-catching displays and personable customer service. In order for an ecommerce business to make sales over the long run, it has to attract customers to regularly visit its site – to bookmark a web address or open weekly emails. That’s why it’s important to make customers loyal – so that you constantly get traffic to your site and increase conversions. As you may know, there are different schools of thought on how to create this customer loyalty.
Help Customers:
My parents own a café, and I remember asking my mom once why every time a new customer wanted to buy a bottle of water she would mention the self-service filtered water fountain, which was free. I thought she was missing a selling opportunity, but actually she was establishing a long-term relationship with patrons. In his June 28 blog, Michael Stelzner interviewed award-winning blogger Jay Baer about his new book, Youtility: Why Smart Marketing Is About Help Not Hype. Baer argues that there are only two letters that differentiate “selling” from “helping,” and realizing this distinction is key to successful marketing. Baer cites the example of a man who Tweeted he was looking for a veterinarian. A nearby hotel suggested one, thereby establishing a quality relationship between a company and client. That company will likely be near the top of the list when the man needs to book a hotel. Customers don’t want to be treated as marketing targets. They want to trust the company they’re buying from and feel valued. As Stelzner blogged, “If you sell something, you make a customer today. But if you help someone, you can create a customer for life.”
Seek Emotional Loyalty:
In January, Direct Marketing magazine asked, “What’s more valuable to business performance: emotional or behavioral loyalty?” Larry Freed, president and CEO of ForeSee responded to the question by arguing that to make truly loyal customers, you have to consider customers’ emotions over their behavior. “With behavioral loyalty, the customer is loyal to the system, not to the company, which means they aren’t truly loyal at all,” Freed said. And if customers aren’t loyal to the company, a competitor can easily lure them with an improved system (i.e. increased rewards, lower prices). The only way to guarantee long-term success is through “true” loyalty, emotional loyalty. Even though achieving this is more challenging than analyzing behavioral data alone, it is extremely beneficial. “Loyalty isn’t something brands create; it’s something consumers grant based on trust,” said Nada Stirrat, chief revenue officer at Acxiom, explained in a December 2012 Direct Marketing article, “Loyalty Reprogrammed,” by Al Urbanksi.
Increase Customer Satisfaction:
One way to increase customer satisfaction is to make a short survey asking them what they like about your site and what they don’t. Is it easy to navigate? How can the service improve? Freed explains, “When customers are highly satisfied … they simply cannot imagine using another product or service.” And when customers are happy, they will spread the word – a priceless form of viral marketing.
