What Are The Best Ways To Keep Your Customers Loyal?

It’s one thing to have happy customers. It’s a whole other thing to have customers who insist that they only come to you when they need the products and services you offer. Loyal customers are the best! They not only keeping coming back to support your brand, but they often tell their friends and family members about it as well. Customer loyalty, it should be mentioned, isn’t given – it’s earned.

So how, exactly, do you earn customer loyalty? Well, there’s definitely a list of things you can do to earn customer loyalty. And being genuine is up at the top of the list. In our last blog, we commented upon the importance of being truthful and having genuine interactions with your customers. On Kissmetrics.com, Brian Honigman explains that business owners need to speak to their customers like people – not like readers of a press release.

He reveals that one of the best ways to do this is to be active on social media. Platforms such as Facebook and Twitter give you the opportunity to answer customer questions in a less formal way than you may be used to. As well, by using social media to address customer queries and concerns, you expose to a much larger audience than one person, just how dedicated you are to providing prompt and attentive customer service.

How important is word-of-mouth promotion to customer loyalty? The truth is that it couldn’t be more important! Getting customers to tell other people about your business is the very definition of customer loyalty. Keeping the popularity of social media in mind, it’s important to remember that word spreads quicker these days than ever before. Honigman reminds us that negative reviews can spread just as quickly as positive ones.

“A third of consumers say they experience rude customer service at least once a month, and 58% of them tell their friends,” he reports, “This is exactly how word of mouth can work against your company’s reputation for the long term. It’s very important to be respectful of a customer’s mood when trying to resolve an issue they have with your company. Keeping your patience is key to giving your customer the time to air out their issue.”

What role does active listening play in securing loyalty? Many consumers choose to switch the companies they do business with after one of the companies got an order wrong. With so many options available to Canadian consumers, it’s of vital importance that you properly listen to your customers so that you’re always getting their orders right. Listening – and not assuming you know what they want – will help to minimize needless mistakes.

“Listen to your customer, without interruption,” insists author, Doug Sandler on his website, “Customers appreciate when you listen to the words they are saying and respond based upon their questions, points and concerns. Give them an opportunity to speak and respond appropriately, without interrupting them. If you have been in your position for a long period of time, you have heard the same questions many times.”

Can offering payment options assist in boosting customer loyalty? At Canadian POS Corporation, we have many years of experience working with Canadian business owners who have reported that their customer relationships have only strengthened thanks to the fact that they use either our Countertop or Wireless POS terminals to accept their credit cards, debit cards and gift cards.

For more information about how we provide you with these solutions, give us a call at 1-877-748-2884 or email us at info@localhost.