5 Ways to Build Loyal Customers

What percentage of your site’s customers return to make a second or third purchase? According to Experian, it’s six-to-twelve times cheaper to sell to an existing customer than a new one.

Business owners can use this to their advantage by building loyal customers, which is something that we’re going to discuss in today’s blog post.

Avoid Generic Emails

Rather than sending the same generic email every customer, customize your marketing emails according to the recipient. Customers who see their name included in an email will feel a greater connection with the respective company. And this is actually easier than it sounds, thanks to the customer relationship management (CRM) software such as Infusionsoft. Using Infusionsoft, you can create segmented lists of contacts’ email addresses, customizing them with tokens for names, geographic region, etc.

Deliver on Time

When a customer places an order, they expect it to arrive on the estimated date of delivery. If the company takes days just to “process” the order, it will subsequently take longer to arrive. And long delivery times are cited as one of the most common complaints among online consumers. This is why Amazon has experienced such a high level of success with its Amazon Prime program, as customers can elect for free 2-day shipping on thousands of items. Granted, you don’t have to necessarily offer 2-day shipping to your customers, but getting products on the delivery vehicles quickly in a timely, transparent manner will go a long way towards creating loyal customers.

Make Yourself Available

If a customer has a question or concern about an order, they may attempt to contact you via email or phone. Unless this information is clearly listed on your website, however, they won’t be able to reach you, which may cause them to think twice before purchasing another product or service from your business. The bottom line is that you need to make your customer service team readily available to answer customer questions and inquiries.

Respond to Customers

Not every customer will attempt to contact you directly when they have a problem. On the contrary, many will take to social media to share their experiences. As a business owner, you should get into the habit of monitoring social media for mentions of your brand name. If you stumble upon a question or comment, respond to the user. Use a negative comment as an opportunity to turn things around for that customer.

Follow Up With Special Discounts

A fourth way to create loyal customers is to send existing customers special discounts and promo codes. Assuming you use Infusionsoft, you can create a list of customers’ email addresses, sending these users discounts or promo codes via email. In the body of the email, you can include something along the lines of: “Please accept this 15% off coupon as our way of saying thanks for being a loyal customer.”

Have any other loyalty-building tips that you would like to share with our readers? Let us know in the comments section below!