Establishing a tradition of loyalty amongst your consumers will help guarantee your company’s success now and for years to come. It is critical that your business focuses on building and maintaining this loyalty, so it establishes a devoted customer base that will consistently buy from your business, refer your business to friends and family, and help ensure your continued profitability. As Scott Friend, Managing Director of Bain Capital Ventures once stated, “Brand is not something you can sprinkle on an operation after the fact.”
The following tactics will help your company learn the basics in brand loyalty so it can continue to thrive in today’s economy.
“Brand is not something you can sprinkle on an operation after the fact.” -Scott Friend Click To Tweet1. Loyalty Rewards Programs: Creating financial incentives for your customers to keep coming back is essential to the maintenance of their brand loyalty. Develop a loyalty reward program that will make frequent customers feel appreciated, both personally and financially. For example, offer a free service or rebate if a customer spends a certain amount of money, give coupons or discounts increasing value to customers as they hit certain monetary targets, or start a frequent customer points program where points can translate into coupons for use on your company’s services.
2. Improve Customer Service: Customer service is one aspect of any business that can always improve. Making customer service a priority in your business plan is critical to the creation and maintenance of loyal consumers. To improve upon customer service, send surveys to current customers to glean valuable feedback on your company. Take both positive and negatives comments into consideration and revise your business plan to adapt to consumer desires. Always send an apology letter when a consumer has a negative experience with your company, and consider offering coupons or discounts as consolation. Also, ensure that your brand is consistently reliable, trustworthy, friendly, and communicates well with its customers.
3. Communicate: As is true in any relationship, communication is the key to developing brand loyalty amongst your consumers. Make your customers feel a part of your business by updating them with internal and external business happenings via weekly e-newsletters and frequent blog posts. Remember that whenever emailing, mailing, or calling customers, always refer to them by name when possible. Further, create an ongoing two-way conversation with consumers using social media to deepen your connections.
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At Clarity Quest, we build strong brands for technology and healthcare companies. Contact our branding specialists to learn how we can help!
