Customer Follow Up Is King!
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Do you follow up with with your customers and affiliates on a regular basis?
Many companies do a poor job of communicating with customers and overlook one of their biggest sources of revenue. In fact, many companies believe that once a sale is made the follow up process should end. Unfortunately they are losing a significant opportunity to build additional customer satisfaction, establish better rapport, credibility, lower returns, and increase their knowledge of the user experience.
Follow up is for more than just prospects. In fact, following up with customers is just as important. Post purchase follow up is overlooked by many businesses but can be implemented easily. Consider applying a basic process that can benefit overall consumer satisfaction significantly. Your process may include:
- Training to teach a customer how to use a product.
- Answering commonly asked questions before they are asked.
- Teaching users about lesser known features.
- Providing support contact information.
Don’t stop with customers. Also reach out to your affiliates. This can improve relationships and prioritize your products over others being promoted. The reality is that in most affiliate or reseller programs over 90% of affiliates never do anything. By properly following up with new and existing affiliates you can help increase the percentage of those actively promoting your products and often see immediate results.
Here are some ideas to consider for engaging affiliates and improving outcomes:
- Provide promotional material.
- Teach effective promotional techniques.
- Share best practices from top affiliates.
- Product education.
- Reminders to get the affiliate to take action.
- Introduce contests and incentives.
Whether you are focusing on improving the communication with your customers or affiliates (or both), consider what you do as being directly tied to increased revenue. Too often companies focus all of their energy on prospecting and not enough on nurturing existing relationships.
Look at your customer communication program today and ask, “how can I better communicate to my customers to improve loyalty, develop relationships, and generate more sales?”
Marketing Blog founder and top-selling author Michael Fleischner has been featured on The TODAY Show, ABC World News, and Bloomerg Radio. 
8 comments :
We understand our customer requriment then we will go for selling our product it is good for both seller or purchager
I completely agree with all the information presented in this posting. It seems as though in today’s marketplace companies are forgetting about the importance of follow-ups. It’s amazing what a difference they make in regards to customer loyalty. I recently received a massage at a local massage therapist school. It was a pleasant massage, but what made it even better was the call I received the next day. The call was short, mainly asking how I felt and how my experience was, but it made a huge difference in regards to my attitude towards the school. That call as well as the service I received will definitely make me a repeat customer. I think that if more companies realized the importance of follow-up and implemented some sort of system, they could see a drastic increase in sales and customer satisfaction.
Just came across your blog but got some useful information, keep posting.
Thanks for a wonderful post.
Being in customer service for quite sometime now, Constant communication with customers is our first priority. Marketing thru word of mouth is something that we never take for granted. The more satisfied customer, the more revenue and more potential clients will come.
I am satisfy with your title Customer Follow Up is king
For several years my web-based business selling marketing gifts and promotional products thrived on just new customers coming to my website. This year things have slowed down, probably due to economy related reasons, and I have started really following up with customers that I haven't heard from in a while and the response has been amazing. I found out that, although I really seemed to connect with many of my customers at the time of the original order, a year later when they needed my services again, they had forgotten my website. If not for follow-up, I would lose lots of great customers. Plus, if you can follow-up without being pushy and annoying (and not too often), most customers appreciate the follow-up.
Agreed. I'm currently having trouble with a company who has given me TERRIBLE customer service. Soon I'll be posting a complete history of this bad service on my blog, and it could end up costing them significant revenue. In the Internet age, the word about bad customer service can spread quickly.
In marketing we should keep following things in mind
• Identify which customers are your best prospects.
• Evaluate company data against your industry or market.
• Track results so you learn what works.
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