In an increasingly competitive online market, it’s never been more important to keep customers happy – whereas many businesses previously placed emphasis on product quality above all else, customer service standards have become crucial in the digital age. Customer-focused businesses prioritise the needs of their clients by promoting company cultures based on user experience and customer satisfaction. With 96% of companies highlighting customer satisfaction as a key growth factor, taking a more stringent approach to customer focus could work wonders for your bottom line – but how can you make your business more customer-focused?
Involve the customer – Want to expand your client base, create meaningful customer relationships and get better results for your business? One of the easiest ways to improve the customer focus of your business is by making your customers feel valued and involved. Seek contributions from your customers wherever possible, such as feedback forms, live chats, surveys, or polls regarding product development – taking the opinions and knowledge of your customers on board is highly beneficial and can only work to boost satisfaction.
Understand the customer journey – If you want to focus more on your customers, it’s essential that you understand their journey and that their experience is positive from the beginning. Generally speaking, the customer journey is broken down into 5 stages: awareness (this is usually achieved through marketing or word-of-mouth recommendations); consideration (where a potential customer considers using your services); purchase decision (where a customer decides to purchase your product for the first time); retention (where a customer repeatedly engages with the company); and advocacy. Once the client has reached the final stage, they can be considered a loyal customer likely to recommend your business to others.
Build relationships and loyalties – Taking insight and feedback from your customers is a great way to start building relationships and fostering loyalty. While it may be relatively easy to attract new clients, retaining customers can be a little more tricky, so you must try to build lasting relationships. A great way to show your appreciation to customers is by introducing a loyalty program, which clients can use to reap rewards for making regular purchases or referrals.
Produce marketing that is customer focused – Remember to treat your customers as individuals – rather than producing generic, one-size-fits-all marketing content, take the time to do some market research and get to know your potential clients. Make use of the data and metric insights at your disposal to produce targeted marketing content based on the age, interests, hobbies, spending habits, and lifestyle of your customers. Luckily, it’s never been easier to produce effective targeted marketing content on Instagram and other social media platforms. Remember to produce content that’s relevant at every stage of the customer journey – while it may be tempting to focus on attracting new clients, never forget to check in with your most loyal customers and keep them updated with new content and offers regularly.