Your products and services are the core notions around which your small business was built but are they the single most important aspect of it? Albeit vital, there is another crucial aspect of immense significance – your customers.
Your customers are the reason why you adapt your products, change the packaging, tweak your marketing strategies, and expand to other markets. Their direct and indirect influence has incredible reach and therefore boosting the relationship with your present and potential customers is of the utmost importance. With that in mind, here are some killer tactics for you to try out.
Work on your brand identity
Brand identity is not just your brand’s logo – it represents all of the elements that make up your brand, both visual and contextual and distinguish your brand in the eyes of your customers. You cannot hope to get return customers or attract new ones if you are not certain what your brand stands for because simply put if you aren’t certain, they won’t be able to create a meaningful connection with your brand.
So, when creating your goal setting strategy, make sure you include reinforcing your brand identity in it. You need to take a good look at your logo, colors, design and first ensure they represent one whole and that they are in accordance with what you want them. After that, you should work on consistency because customers will be confused and put off if, for example, your brand has a bubbly personality on social media but a very strict tone on the website.
Negative comments matter
Dissatisfied users, misunderstandings, and negative comments are common occurrences and although they might not be pleasant, you need to accept instead of ignoring them. In fact, not responding to them is the worst course of action to take because your brand will be perceived as careless towards their customers. Instead, face the negative comments with politeness and strive to get to the bottom of the problem.
If it was indeed a mistake on your part, you need to apologize and compensate the customers in some manner, such as sending them a gift. If the issue was a misunderstanding, you will perhaps learn that some portion of your website needs to be written more clearly. In both instances, you will have changed their perception of your business and those few customers can now spread the word about your transparency and fairness. Customer feedback is a priceless tool not only in your efforts to improve your reputation but also to improve your entire business.
Build trust with customers
Acknowledging customer dissatisfaction leads to greater transparency, and those are just a few of the elements that serve to improve your relationship with customers. However, to be able to take the right steps to retain and attract customers, you might need some help. For starters, you need to understand customer behavior to be able to provide them with what they need and entice them to take a particular course of action.
This phenomenon of people imitating the actions of others is called social proof and many businesses are actively applying solutions such as social proof tool Cue to get a deeper understanding of their customers’ behavior. Knowing your customers allows you to find the most optimal ways to show them you care about their experience and consequently strengthen your relationship with them. Customers’ trust is a fragile thing and needs to be nurtured with transparency and backed by data.
Leverage social media
Most modern businesses’ relationships with their customers can be described as long-distance ones, having in mind that they are mostly or in their entirety built and maintained online. For these relationships not to grow cold, you need to meet your customers halfway, in a field they spend a lot of their time – the social media platforms.
However, there is no need to worry, you needn’t be on all platforms – you need to use the data you have on the most popular networks among your customers and build a strong online presence there. Engage with your customers, use user-generated content to promote your brand and show them how much you appreciate their involvement. Organize competitions and make sure you respond to each comment and question that they have for your brand.
Over to you
For your business to grow, you need to be backed up by your customer base, which means both present and potential ones. Their interest in your brand and products are what will shape many of your strategies so you need to have them on your good side.
You need to first offer them a confident brand identity and by exhibiting transparency and your care for them, gain their trust. In addition to that, you should boost your social media engagement because this is where your customers get informed, purchase things, and look for entertainment. For an entrepreneur, the relationship with your customers stands shoulder to shoulder with the relationships you have with your family and friends.