How much of your time is spent chasing new leads around Fredericksburg? How much better would it be if more and more customers were returning to your small business more and more often – thrilled with your services, and happy to pay again for your products! If you’re thrilling your customers, but they just aren’t returning, then an important process to add to your business is a customer follow up procedure.
There are a lot of benefits following up with your customers regularly including increased trust, acquiring testimonials, getting feedback, receiving new referrals, and getting returning customers. Here are some ideas for types of follow up, as well as some tips:
- Say “Thank You”: A simple thank you card can go a long way! Show that you appreciate their business, their time, and their person with a hand addressed & signed Thank You card with a sincere message of gratitude.
- Create a Post-Sale Process: Take an hour or so this evening to sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil and think about your customer. What is their experience after your work is complete? What questions do they often have? What issues usually arise? What maintenance or changes are frequently needed? How often would they like to just be “checked up on” to “make sure everything is A-OK”? Create a simple weekly or monthly process for following up. Demonstrate your dedication to doing things right, going above and beyond, and being there to help them. (If you read last week’s post which talked about utilizing a CRM, this is another area a CRM can help you!)
- Be Personal: If your business leans heavily on larger projects, you might add personal followups to your post-production process. Following up once or twice a year with a genuine personal phone call, card, or even e-mail, will ask little of your time. But this can help maintain a personal connection with your customers. It keeps you in the forefront of their mind when they are ready for the next step, or when they are talking about related topics with their friends and family. Put this into your Post-Sale process to mark these dates on the calendar or add it into your CRM.
- Be Educational: Don’t just throw advertising and coupons at your customers! Instead provide short pieces of helpful knowledge. This is easy to do once a quarter or once a month – especially if you delegate it to your team and oversee the process. The key here is to outline the topics for the year and set your staff up with a checklist of how to repeat it each time.
Having a quality follow up process for customers is just a important to your business as having one for new leads! Maintaining a personal and interactive connection with your customers can lead to long-term recurring arrangements that are good for them, and good for you! Keep growing your business by taking care of those that got you to where you are today.
Do you have any other ideas, suggestions, or lessons learned related to a post-sale follow up process? Please share them with us below!