For many businesses, customer retention is paramount, especially in uncertain economic times. Inflation and the cost-of-living crisis (UK and Europe) has made customers set stricter priorities while reducing their spending leaving many businesses under pressure to reduce customer churn as much as possible. This is especially important for SMBs who might not have the financial ability to lose a large percentage of their customers and be able to continue business as usual.
Loyal customers are not likely to cut ties with your business, especially if they continually see value in the company and have good experiences with each side of the business (both online and offline). But customer loyalty can’t be bought and with so many other businesses competing for a customer’s attention, making sure you’re continually providing value is the key to improving retention while reducing churn.
But how do you improve customer retention and what tools are available to help SMBs?
Here are three ways to improve customer retention:
Customer Retention and the Customer Journey
Did you know that less than 1 in 4 businesses are able to engage with their customers on a frequent basis? This means roughly 80% of customers are being provided with a subpar experience, opening the door for competitors to swoop in, provide a better customer experience and take your clientele.
Frequent, personalized experiences guide a customer through the buying process leaving the customer feeling valued and positive about their experience with a business. This in turn can then open up opportunities to cross sell and/or renew contracts, but more about that later.
“Simply listening to your customers drives powerful results that will transform your business.” – Source
Marketing Automation solutions have the ability to track, engage and nurture a customer through the use of intelligent triggers which in turn provides the customer with the right content at the right time.
For example, imagine you’re thinking of buying a new washing machine. You check out a few websites for market research and then download a piece of content or sign up to a newsletter once you have a particular model in mind. You then close down the website as you’re still in the discovery stage of the buying process and aren’t ready to make a financial commitment yet.
A few days later you look on the website again and check out the pricing page of the model you want. The company then automatically sends spec overview content for your desired model in response to the trigger of you looking at the pricing page, with a discount code directly to your inbox. This seals the deal, and you buy the washing machine.
By collecting customer data and utilizing it through the use of Marketing Automation and triggers, your business can track the customer throughout their journey. This will provide customers with the right content when necessary to further guide them along the buyer journey.
This type of personalized customer experience improves customer loyalty as they leave your business feeling listened to and valued throughout their journey.
Want more Marketing Automation scenarios like the one above? Click here for our top 5.
Customer Retention and Nurture
Many businesses might think that once a product or solution has been bought then it is the end of the customer journey as the final transaction has been made. But that’s simply not true.
When customers spend a significant amount of money (on items or any other type of product) they want to get their monies worth, and businesses can help do this by providing valuable insights which help customers maintain the health of their purchase.
In our example above, a business could then send automatic monthly follow-ups right into the customer’s inbox outlining how to clean the washing machine, list typical problems and how to resolve them along with discount codes for cleaning products. Learn more about this type Email Marketing here.
“Email nurture campaigns are a vital part of any successful inbound marketing strategy” – Source
Continually providing value (nurturing) is how businesses can help keep customers engaged and loyal, making them more likely to buy again in the future. This type of approach utilizes Marketing Automation to facilitate and improve customer journeys which are personalized, engaging and should be used in both B2B and B2C industries.
Remember the cost of acquiring a new customer can be 7 times the cost of retaining an existing customer, so using nurturing strategies to continually engage with your customers not only reduces churn but also presents a cost-saving opportunity for many SMB businesses.
Customer Retention and Cross Sell
It might seem counter intuitive to try and cross sell to customers during uncertain times, however, when done correctly cross selling can be the perfect solution for both you and your customer’s problems.
To cross sell means to “sell related or complementary products to a customer” and can be used during difficult times to help your customer solve a specific problem or improve the processes they are currently performing.
But how do you know if your customer is experiencing a problem before they tell you about it? The answer is intelligent lead scoring data.
Above we discussed the importance of Marketing Automation data and triggers when engaging with and nurturing a customer, but in this instance Marketing Automation can be used as a method of tracking and learning about your customers.
Depending on the type of data you ask for, you can have access to a whole range of qualifying factors. For instance, job title, industry, aims and so on. Using all this data (and the triggers noted) your team can begin to see trends and problems customers within a specific industry or job title encounter, and proactively offer solutions to other customers of a similar persona.
This way customers don’t have to seek out another company for a solution, feel listened to and most importantly, know that your business is continually providing value through problem solving solutions that are personalized to them.
Cross sell is best performed when both Marketing and Sales teams are unified under one technological solution that bridges the gap between each team both in communication and data. Find out more about Sales and Marketing unification technologies by checking out our Sales Engagement solution here.
Economic downturns can present many problems for SMBs as customers get more wary about their spending habits. However, through the use of high-level marketing strategies and technologies such as Marketing Automation, businesses can keep their customer retention high as they continually provide value to the customer throughout their journey.
Are you a B2B business leader or owner who wants to find out more about industry and marketing trends for 2023? Download our latest eBook “The Marketing Survival Guide 2023” to find out more about Viral Marketing, Sales and Marketing Together, Sales Automation and Omnichannel Marketing.
