Just like you, customers have jobs and they are busy people. It’s your job to think about them all the time, but don’t expect they are thinking about your business every minute of the day. That right there is why customer engagement is very important. If you really want and value your return customers, you should plan to have a relationship and a serious one at that with your customer.
Every business needs to have a connection with every customer, it goes a long way to have that personal touch.
For example, when First Bank rebranded, they used the copy ‘You first’ indicating that the customer should be first all the time. FCMB went with the copy ‘My bank and I’ pointing out the same thing which is how they can better engage the customer.
Is your company lacking in customer engagement? Follow these simple tips, they can help remind your customers there are actual people behind your business.
1. Keep in touch with your customers.
A popular business co-founder, Hartsock says that “Companies must realize that the sales cycle never really ends”. Do you agree? He also said, Staying in touch with your customers is important to customer engagement.
“If a couple of months go by after the sale and the customer does not know how to use a product, then the return of investment for that client is zero,” she says.
And that customer may remember that the next time they need your business and may go elsewhere.
2. Expect and work with negative feedbacks.
Listen and listen well, in a business, it is the least satisfied customers that matter the most. Look at it this way, when you get negative feedbacks and go back to work on them, you would have a near perfect business, because even the people that are hard to satisfy will be eventually. So, you don’t have to be excited that a customer thinks your business is all glorious, but you probably shouldn’t ignore the feedbacks, work on them like your business depended on those few customers — remember, it’s the customer first.
3. Give, Give and Give.
As a company, the perception a customer gets from seeing you give back to your society and feeling your impact in their immediate environment is immeasurable. When customers know you are engaged in helping their community, they most often become loyal and in some cases feel the obligation to give back themselves, which is a win-win for you, your customers and your community.
For example, in Nigeria, both private companies and government engage in CSR. A company like NNPC in 2001 the NNPC, recognizing the importance of education to the development of our dear country, introduced the annual national quiz competition for secondary schools across the country.
4. Speak more often to your customers
If you find yourself an audience full of potential customers—like in a festival, a chamber of commerce meeting or even in rotary club—and you’re a good speaker, you may just be able to engage with your customers.
Speaking engagements are quite necessary and more impactful now more than ever, especially because humans are more disconnected now than ever, we have less and less direct contacts with each other.
Just being in front of a targeted audience as the expert is powerful. Share your company objectives, share insights, share powerful contents with customers that will enable you to engage them and eventually convert them even before they step out of the room.
5. Understand your customers’ lingua franca
It is the jet age and to be honest its quite simple to target your audience. You can use tools to monitor the behaviour of your target market, where they are from, their ages and so on. These will give you true insights into who and what your customer is and how much your customers are willing to spend.
Imagine having all these information, you can speak to every customer using their individual language. For example, you want to engage a young adult and convert him to be your customer. Where do you go? Social media… what time?
You can literally take over the world by just understanding your customers properly, solving their problems and eventually if you just engage.