Al Agrawal, a writer for Forbes, has written an article worth noting. It’s entitled, 5 Ways to Build Customer Trust. When I saw the title, a thought ran through my mind: Why would my company or anyone’s company for that matter care about building customer trust? What advantage does a company gain by taking the time and spending the resources to answer and appease customers, especially the rude ones? Well, according to some studies, loyal customers are worth up to 10 times as much as their first purchase (White House Office of Consumer Affairs). Marketing Metrics reported that there is a 5-20% probability of selling to a new prospect and a 60-70% probability of selling to an existing customer. So, maybe it is time to review some ways to enhance customer loyalty by listening, helping, and genuinely serving the customer.
Agrawal, in my opinion, has not written something new about caring for customers, but he has consolidated a plethora of marketing research into five basic ways to enhance a company’s customer base. For one, according to Agrawal, a company should “encourage online reviews.” Leading companies have known this for years, but the difficulty is getting customers to do it. Usually, companies offer an incentive, such as coupons, discounts, and giveaways. Secondly, Agrawal stated that content marketing should be employed with great skill—“everyone should know exactly what you stand for and exactly what you are in the business of doing.” This should be applied, especially to your target audience. Find the ones who give a care or would be interested in what you say about yourself; however, the best course of action that preempts any method of responding to negativity is to do a good job with the customer in the first place. Do it right the first time and there is never a need to do it over again.
