The most successful businesses don’t sell the products and services they think customers will buy. Instead, they find out what their customers need and sell to them accordingly. While getting to know customers can be a challenge, it’s certainly worth undertaking for the sake of greater brand loyalty and higher revenue. It can start by taking advantage of social media.
Modern Businesses Must Have a Social Media Presence
What better way to interact with and get to customers than to be in the same place where they hang out online. With a business account on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or other major platforms, businesses can learn more about the habits, interest, and buying habits of customers without ever asking them a thing. It also gives customers the chance to interact and give recommendations to each other.
By conducting social listening, then responding to inquiries, praises, and complaints publicly, the brand can demonstrate its firm commitment to customer service. Creating a private Facebook group for select groups of customers makes it even easier to learn who they are.
Turn Unhappy Customers into Loyal Customers
Before the Internet era, an unhappy customer might grumble to a few friends and leave it at that. Today, hundreds or even thousands of people can read his or her poor review of a business almost immediately. That can feel discouraging and intimidating to a business owner, but it doesn’t have to feel that way.
Looking at the negative review as an opportunity to reach out to see what went wrong can turn everything around for the better. Customers are often so impressed that a business wants to improve because of their feedback that they return as loyal customers from that point forward.
Create a Short, Open-Ended Survey
People often don’t want others to see them as a complainer or feel too modest to share their honest feedback with a business. Unfortunately, the lack of authentic feedback can be detrimental to brands and prevent customers from getting what they really want and need. Giving customers the opportunity to complete an anonymous survey with open-ended questions is one way around this dilemma. Be sure the survey is no more than five questions to avoid taking up a lot of customers’ time.
Hold or Sponsor a Community Event
Any business with a physical location has an excellent opportunity to get to know its customers better by attaching its name to a local event. It could host a family carnival on a Saturday, for example, or sponsor a Little League team. This not only gets the business name out there it also brings management and customers together on a closer level. Brands should be certain to take advantage of the extra time with customers to learn more about them.
Create a Profile of the Typical Customer
After gathering data about groups of customers, creating a profile of a composite customer can help to serve everyone better. It should include a thorough understanding of customer likes and dislikes and demographics like age range, income, and family status. When used correctly, the customer profile is often the first step towards improving service and increasing profits.
