As a working mom, you understand just as well as anyone that there are too few hours in the day to waste your time and energy on anyone or anything that isn’t worthwhile. When you apply this mantra to the businesses you patronize, you create a framework for how to treat your own customers to create greater brand loyalty. Here’s how:
Streamline Your Service
When a customer calls a business to deal with an issue, they want to see their problem resolved in as little time as possible. But, if they are forced to speak with representatives from multiple departments, a “quick” phone call can take 45 minutes or longer. Believe me: No one wants to wait on hold and explain the issue to each representative to whom they’ve been transferred.
You can help build customer loyalty by streamlining your customer service process to take as little time as possible. To do this, start using a cloud contact center to manage your company information so that customer service representatives can easily input and access customer notes across multiple channels (live chat, email, phone, and social media support).
In addition, avoid having customer service representatives read excessively wordy scripts. Instead, get straight to the point by encouraging direct communication that’s tailored to each customer.
Treat Customers as You Want to Be Treated
Use the Golden Rule to retain your customers and attract new business simultaneously. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
- Periodically send customers personalized promotions for a discount on their next purchase.
- Host customer appreciation events throughout the year that feature unique gifts with any purchase.
Host a mom’s night out shopping event if you have a brick-and-mortar location. You may also want to offer guests wine, hors d’oeuvres, and desserts to make the event feel extra special and encourage guests to buy more.
Boost Team Morale
Treating customers as you’d want to be treated starts with treating your employees similarly. Plus, boosting team morale can bolster customer loyalty, because a happy employee treats customers better than a disgruntled one.
Get real with your team members and ask them for suggestions about improving your workplace. What would make each team member happier to go to work each day? Ask what types of perks or benefits employees wish you offered and work to add some of these to your team.
It’s also helpful to randomly do nice things for your team, such as ordering in lunch for everyone, cutting out an hour early on a Friday, and treating everyone to happy hour or simply bringing in bagels and coffee one morning. Extra effort can go a long way in showing your team that you care.
Get to the Root of Any Problem
When a customer identifies an issue they have with your product, it’s critical that he or she feels heard by your customer service reps and that a resolution is eventually reached to retain brand loyalty. But the next steps are equally as crucial to the loyalty of your customers. So, be sure that when a product issue arises, instruct your team to get to the root of the problem in order to prevent this issue from happening again.
