What is the one thing business owners across industry verticals cannot afford to waste? Why customer loyalty and advocacy? After all, the 100-year-old Pareto Principle states that 80% of business profits come from just 20% of top customers, and it still works.
However, the sad news is that many business leaders pay attention to their bigger/biggest accounts. While nothing is wrong with it, you miss getting a worm's eye view here. How?
Let's understand with the help of an analogy – Suppose there are two customers, one with a total of 1000£ to spend and the other with 100£. While the former buys 500£ worth of products from you and uses the rest on competitor brands, the latter uses the entire 100£ on your offerings alone (each time). In the larger picture, which is worth more – 50% of wallet share or 100%?
Additionally, you never know - the smaller accounts (impressed with your brand) may become such marketers that they draw in new clients that are more profitable. Therefore, while it is essential for you to pursue lucrative consumers, don't neglect your loyal yet modest clientele.
Wondering how to do that? This guide lists seven ways to drive engagement with loyal customers.
Reasons You Should Engage With Your Loyal Customers
Before we get into how you can increase engagement with loyal customers, let's discuss why it is vital to do so in detail. Listed below are four points in favor of driving engagement with loyal customers.
- Higher Degree Of Trust
Everyone likes to know that they're appreciated. Business owners can never become complacent in their efforts, especially with loyal clients. And if you're grateful for their repeated purchases and loyalty to your brand, you must show it.
As a result, customers feel more valued, which strengthens their relationship with your brand. Like any other relationship, a brand's relationship with its customers can only thrive when there is open communication and respect between the two parties.
In today's world, the customer is always right. Dedicated customers may consider switching to competitors if they feel neglected for too long.
- Enhanced Customer Experience
A good brand will always follow up with a customer, even after making their 100th purchase, to see if any friction points need to be resolved.
If yes, the next step is to work on straightening out the crooked edges to ensure a seamless customer experience from start to finish. This is good because it is possible that while a customer never faced any issues with your products for their previous 99 purchases, they might face them during their 100th purchase.
You will be able to prevent problems and solve them through follow-ups. Customers are willing to overlook a brand's mistakes but never negligence!
- Reduced Marketing Costs
Think of it this way: Is it easier to maintain an existing friendship or to make new friends? As with generating new leads, nurturing them, moving them down the sales funnel, and finally converting them into paying customers (this does not include building loyalty! ), keeping existing customers—especially loyal ones—is more cost-effective.
With that measure, you cannot afford to lose a single loyal customer! Longstanding customers have already gone through the buying cycle and do not require extensive marketing efforts like prospects.
This study revealed that customer retention is five times cheaper than customer acquisition. Thus, a straightforward discount or an offer can quickly attract devoted clients. You should flourish with your campaigns if you carefully craft them and avoid overselling.
- Better Outreach With Brand Advocates
Are you confident about delivering unmatched experiences to your loyal client base? Then, you can stop worrying about attracting and engaging new ones.
Yes, as much as you are aware of your products and their benefits, equally so is your loyal client base. They have already used your products, know the benefits precisely, and you can be sure they're eager to discuss them.
Plus, since they're an unbiased source of information, other potential customers will consider their recommendations and word-of-mouth more than your brand's marketing efforts. The best part is that brand advocates' help in business outreach comes at no cost!
7 Failsafe Ways To Engage With Loyal Customers
With four solid reasons to drive engagement among loyal customers, you must now dive into seven tactful ways in which you can keep your loyal clients happy.
- Connect Across Social Media Platforms
One powerful way to maintain customer loyalty is to understand the social sentiment and connect with your loyal clients across platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. Analyze customer interactions across social media posts—are they talking about your brand? If yes, then what are they saying?
Whether they are leaving positive comments or grievances, reply to each—thank them for the former and reassure the latter that the issue will be resolved. Make it a point to respond to each and every DM on Instagram, message on Facebook, and tweet on Twitter, as it will help customers feel heard and appreciated.
Loyal customers are more than willing to have frequent brand interactions. If you're lucky, they might even share a social media post (along with a review!) about how your product fits into their lives. Utilize this user-generated material and post it on your page. Even better, you can ask for testimonials by offering a discount or promotional code. Respond to customer success stories and acknowledge them as well. This will keep you at the top of their list.
- Reach out for surveys and feedback
Another way you can engage with loyal customers is through surveys. Loyal customers have been using your products and services for a while. Over time, they can give you a clear picture of what you're doing right and what areas need improvement.
For instance, a customer may love your same-day shipping policy, but they may still feel upset with the lengthy and tedious checkout experience. Combining all such queries in a survey will make your loyal clients feel special and important for brand reputation and equity.
This will also encourage them to give honest answers. You can ask questions like, "would you recommend "product name" to your friends and family?" or "On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely are you to ever consider switching to a competitor brand?"
Additionally, request sincere reviews and feedback from your customers. Send them to links so they can share product images and post reviews. Top reviews should be posted on your website's home page. Even better, you can switch reviews once or twice a week. The surveys and reviews serve as useful tools for learning about each customer's loyalty and the improvements you should make to your goods and services.
- Develop A Micro-Influencer Marketing Program
Nowadays, it's not unusual to open Instagram and discover countless posts with a hashtag for sponsored content or a promotional video for a particular brand's goods. Customers have lost faith in these influencers as a result of an increase in such posts because they are aware that they rarely use the products they are endorsing.
Thankfully, you can bypass all that and use micro-influencers (among your loyal customers) – this helps you engage with them and generate new customers. Micro-influencers are usually accounts with 10,000 to 15,000 followers. They also have better connections and engagement rates with their audiences.
When you choose micro-influencers among your loyal customers, they feel like they should – special! The idea that the customer can persuade their followers to try your brand is more important than just the discount or freebies. Engage them in conversation by leaving comments, liking their posts, and sharing them.
- Establish A Solid Loyalty Program
In a market so cut-throat, your greatest concern must be preventing loyal customers from turning to competition. For such a strategy, there can be no room for complacency because, at any given time, you are vulnerable to losing customers to competitors.
Develop a solid loyalty program. Even your competitors may have one in place, so make sure the rewards are unique. One way would be to create tiers to make the most loyal customers feel appreciated. For instance - Food and Beverage companies may come up with the following tiers:
-Foodie – An average tag that every loyal customer gets
-Big Foodie – Those who place at least 15 reviews
-Super Foodie – Those who place 30 reviews with at least 5 photos
-Connoisseurs –Those who place over 50 reviews with at least 10 photos
One of the best loyalty programs in the Food & Beverage industry is run by the renowned Starbucks. The company cleverly use a tiered reward system to encourage its customers to reach VIP status. Each tier has a free gift to unlock through small increments, enabling customers to increase their purchase frequency.
For instance – Just $25 extra could secure you a free coffee. Then, for another $125, you could have a free lunch waiting.
Want to set up such a powerful loyalty rewards program quickly? Yollty offers a digital loyalty program that can be set up in five minutes at most, is user-friendly, and can reach 100% of your audience. With a complete understanding of the strenuous demands of business, it can get challenging to keep (loyal) clients happy all the time. With Yollty, all restaurants, beauty salons, coffee shops, vape shops, retail firms, and even car washes can stay in the loop of their loyal customers. Having a stamp of approval from over 1000 customers worldwide, you can lean on the Yollty advantage!
- Express Your Heartfelt Gratitude in Personalized Ways
eCommerce can often come across as impersonal for customers. However, these barriers can be removed through heartfelt notes of gratitude personalized for every loyal customer. Let's take the example of Amazon and Etsy – many stores send handmade, personalized gratitude notes with each order.
Some even provide complimentary goods as a token or gift. Perhaps there is a slightly different way to apply this strategy for devoted customers: for every fifth or tenth purchase, send a personalised note and a free product, or offer a sizable flat discount on that purchase.
It can be challenging to write gratitude notes for each order as it can be remembering order numbers. Your customer loyalty plan may involve a monthly goal for how many notes need to be written.
Besides notes and free gifts, there are other ways to let your customers know you're grateful, including:
-Package Inserts
-Personal connections through videos
-Post-purchase discounts
-Spotlighting them across social media platforms
- Experiment With Different Content Formats
A singular type of content format considerably limits brand exposure. While content is always one of the best ways to engage with loyal customers, everyone is unique and responds differently to different formats.
For instance – Though Gen-Z may respond well to fun podcasts and millennials to videos, Baby Boomers may prefer reading informative blogs packed with rich photos. To reach all demographics and satisfy them, you must create and publish content in relevant formats.
Compared to generic content on the website, formats like videos, blogs, interviews, or case studies are more personal and effective in driving engagement. They are conversational, easy to relate to, and encourage your loyal client base to watch, share, comment, etc.
- Remember Their Important Days
Do we all not expect to be wished for on our birthdays? And how much more exciting it all becomes when an unexpected wish arrives? No one enjoys feeling like Molly Ringwald from Sixteen Candles when her entire family forgot about her birthday, and things only got worse with every embarrassment possible.
Show your loyal customers that you care by remembering their special days. While you can send an email with a special discount offer, the best way to establish a stronger emotional bond is to deliver a personalized postcard along with a free gift (and a discount offer, too!).
No brand ever regretted walking the extra mile for its (loyal) customers. If anything, it makes the experience more personal. Plus, customers always vouch for free goodies while they appreciate a discount!
Put Your Loyal Customers First, and They Will Last!
Most brands recline nonchalantly once they've built solid customer loyalty. While that is commendable, the war has just begun because maintaining customer loyalty is far more challenging.
Think of every repeat customer (whether it's their 5th purchase or 100th) as a guest, and you are the host. In that capacity, it is your responsibility to ensure every vital aspect of customer experience is well taken care of, maybe even made a little better than the day before.
Apply the above-mentioned tips, be consistent in your efforts, and maintain your status as a market leader. On a parting note, always strive to add value to your client's lives, and they will not jump ship!
