People ask me all the time what is the biggest secret to my company growing and keeping a loyal customer base. My customers are my biggest secret to winning as a small business owner. No matter the size of the company big or small most are only focused on obtaining new customers not maintaining relationships with their existing customer base. This is the biggest mistake and something I leverage to my advantage.
Who Is Your Audience
My audience is my target customers and they are a community I focus on building each day of the week. It might seem like I know much about my customers but I pay attention to who they are outside of being my customers. Who are they following on social media, what stores are they shopping, who is their favorite singer, what city do they live in. Al this matters when leveraging them to help you acquire new customers.
Once you know who they are a person, you are able to see if they have friends, families or associates who would like what you offer. On average I spend 90 minutes a day going through my top customers and followers social media profiles.
Trust Something You Don’t Have
Your current customers have a trust with your future customers you don’t particularly have at this moment. Especially, if you’re tapping into their personal network. Imagine if you tapped everyone of your current customers Power of 10 Network friends list. That is a powerful list of customers who are supporting you monthly. Yes, I have customers who purchase products from my company monthly which is how I retain my customers. Always provide your customers new products monthly to sing your praises about. Tap into your customers already established trust they have with their friends.
Ask Them To Share
Let me state you’re not begging or something to ask your customers to share your company. You are asking those who support you to share your business with their friends, family and more. I have no problem with saying tag your business bestie, share on Facebook, post on social media and more. Recently, I had several orders of Build Your Own Planner solely from an Instagram follower sharing her purchase with her followers. That is powerful that they can share my product one time and their social media followers buy immediately. If you’re not asking your current customers to rep your brand you’re going about it wrong. Create a scripted email asking them to share with their friends and followers. Use promo cards that they can give their friends.
Leveraging your existing customer base to attract and retain a new customer base is the smartest and low cost way of marketing for your business.
