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…4 reasons to look at contacting your customers on a monthly basis. This article addresses those who don’t have a monthly contact process with your customer base. Call this contact process a newsletter or whatever you want. You need monthly contact with your customers. Your current and future success depends on the ability to keep in contact with your customers. I will give you four reasons why you should start now a monthly contact program with your customers. You might object. “It’s a great idea but… I don’t have time to make this work; I ‘m too busy running my business; I would rather buy ads and pray they work; My customers are different. They wouldn’t read it; I ‘m comfortable chasing after new customers”. Monthly contact with your customers is not just another “thing” you should do in your business. Monthly contacts with your customers should be the corner-stone of the way you do business. If your customers don’t hear from you, you are gone from their mind. Eventually you are out of business. See if any of these reasons inspires you to start contacting your customers every month. It’s Cheaper to Work with Existing Customers You already know the statistic—it’s 10 times cheaper to work with your existing customer base than chase after new customers. Let’s break that down. Let’s say you spend $10,000 on advertising costs for items like network meetings, yellow pages, ads, brochures, etc. If in a given year you get 100 new customers, then it means that every new customer cost you $100 in advertising costs. Each new prospect takes 3-4 contacts before they become a customer. If your time is worth $50 per hour that means that each new customer is costing you another $200 in your time. What about the time you waste sorting out prospects from tire kickers? How much time is wasted on tire kickers that produce no results? If you offer first time customers discounts or special coupons, how much money are you giving away to make them your customer? You can do your own numbers. The bottom line for many businesses is they are lucky to make any profit on a customer’s first purchase. If your customers don’t hear from you, you will not be on their mind! Existing Customers Are an Easier Sell You know from personal experience that a potential prospect is much harder to sell than one of your current customers. The fact is simple. Once a prospect has become a customer, they cross over an invisible line that says, “I trust you.” “I like you.” “I believe in your company.” Statistics show that a person who has bought from you once is thirty percent more likely to buy from you again. If your work day was filled with “easy sales,” how would that affect your time and your energy? When you’ve had a day of easy sales, hasn’t everything seemed better? If your customers don’t hear from you, you are not on their mind when they go to make a purchase. Customer Referrals—Advertising You Cannot Buy! Have you ever received a referral like this from a friend? “Yes, I got a refrigerator from Smith’s Appliance store about five years ago. It worked fine. I’m not sure if they are still in business.” How likely would you be to use that referral to search out a solution to your refrigerator problem? Once customers have experienced your product and your service, they are now great candidates for providing customer referrals. They have first hand experience with your product or service. They will now recommend you to their friends. This is free advertising, and it’s the most powerful advertising you can use. But if your customers have not heard from you, you are no longer on their mind! Your Competitors are Contacting Your Customers Just because your clients were your customers once, there is no guarantee they will be forever. In fact, customer loyalty in the past several years has dropped, even for well known companies. Your customers are learning every day about new buying options. These may be online options, mail order options, or special niche stores. More and more customers are exercising their buying options. If you are not contacting your customer base, your competitors are. Listen to the radio, the TV, watch the ads in the paper, or check online. Every day, the average person is getting 3,000 messages to buy things. How long do you think it will take before your customer begins to take advantage of offers being made by your competitors? Your customers may not be hearing from you. You can be sure they are hearing from your competitors. Conclusion. Starting a monthly contact process with your customers is not just another business strategy. It’s a different way of operating your business. It will save you dollars; it will increase your profits; it will make your work easier. It will create a much stronger business for your future. I hope this article has inspired you to start your own monthly customer contact program. If you want more practical details about how to create your own monthly contact program and make it effective with your customers, e-mail me Al@successfulmarketingtools.com with the subject line “Monthly Contact Report.” I will send you a free report that shows you practical details about this marketing strategy. Copyright Al Hanzal, 2005. All Rights Reserved Hanzal Enterprises, Inc. 4191 Granite Court Eagan, Minnesota 55123 651-485-3340
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Advice Home Business Technology Online Advertising Motivational Internet Marketing SEO Help Online Games Science Articles Happiness More Articles:1. Free or Not Free – That is the Question By Barbara Hemphill You may be in business for yourself or as a small company, but no matter what, especially if you just started this business, you need publicity! It’s great that your spouse or best friend believes in you. You may even have total strangers tell you what a great idea you have. Some may tell you they wish they had thought of it themselves or had the guts to try it. You know you can do your job well, you know you could make money at this. But as ha… 2. Create Your Own Rumors By Gina Novelle A consultant new in the city asked me how I managed to get business so fast. Working for that marketing company definitely gave me a jump start. That's because I already knew about press releases. Only in business a few months and I already had been in two of the local papers. However, it was my male mentors who introduced me to telemarketing.At the suggestion of calling strangers on the phone was enough to terrify me. There was no way I c… 3. Creating Your Unique Selling Proposition or USP By Andrew Ludlam Creating Your Unique Selling Proposition"Don't tell them what you do. Tell them what you do for them.”To capture a larger market share and remain profitable, you absolutely, positively need to distinguish your products and/or services from your competitors. In other words, you need to make your business special in the eyes of your clients: You need to create a Unique Selling Proposition, or USP.So what is a USP?Simply put a USP is that one dist… 4. Effective Use of Promotional Products and Ad Specialties By Dan Safkow 1. Determine the goals of your promotional products program. Do you want to create awareness? To attract new customers? To reward or provide incentives to existing customers? Remember to determine a means for measuring the results.2. Plan ahead. At minimum, you'll need two to four weeks for production and delivery of standard products. If you wait until the last minute, your choices will be limited and you may pay more. When creating custom ite… |