Acquiring new customers is usually expensive. Getting your existing customers to purchase again is more economical. Should you agree? Or is it even true with your business?
If you think yes, now is an excellent time to build an exclusive customer retention strategy to achieve that. We are going to share a few effective consumer engagement strategies that will help you on this front. Let’s get started.
What Defines Customer Engagement?
Consumer engagement constitutes business activities that a brand uses to increase the frequency of customer interactions. The interaction could be sharing your written brand ad, product manual, YouTube videos, and Facebook posts, etc.
When you boost your customer engagement, you increase the chance that customers become your brand advocates.
Successful interactions would trigger downloads of your app, purchasing your products, or referring you to someone else, just to name a few.
Image Source: https://getsatisfaction.com
Your customer is your brand’s most influential marketing alliance and advocate. What they say about you will be trusted more than any other marketing material, such as blogs, influencer reviews, SEO, ads, etc. Their review often becomes the deciding factor for others when buying a product or service.
Why is Customer Engagement Important?
Consumer engagement is critical to your business’s success because it opens a channel that connects your customers to your brand. A highly engaged customer base means more sales and more revenue. Effective customer engagement converts one time buyers into loyal repeat customers.
Consumer Engagement Strategies to Nail Repeat Sales
Leverage Technology
As per the recent Connected Customer report released by SalesForce, 92% of customers expect companies to use new technologies to create better experiences for customer engagement. Brands should use technology to provide a smooth and seamless customer experience in all channels.
Get Real Everywhere
Brands should use social media to engage with customers and make it fun on all the available platforms. Doing this adds a human factor to the brand. Note that this is easier for B2C brands than B2B businesses. Avoid discussing politics and sensitive topics unless it is relevant.
Be very careful about Brand’s political stand
A brand’s political stance can affect customers’ emotions. The companies need to carefully analyze the pros & cons before going public with a political view. According to a survey conducted by Customer Thermometer on 1000 participants, 65% of the people said that a brand’s political stand disappointed them, and about 60% said that they might boycott a brand if its political stance offends them.
Enhance Your Customer Support
Build multiple channels and mechanisms for customers to reach out to you. Very often, a satisfactorily resolved customer complaint (over mail or phone) would turn a disappointed customer into a happy and loyal customer. Live chat, help desk tools, and feedback forms are effective ways to support and retain customers. The chart below from Shopify shows the impact of customer service on repeat sales.
Make Personalized Communication
Monetate, a leading personalization platform, found that 83% of the retailers who invested separately on personalization were able to beat their revenue goals. And 93% of businesses with an advanced personalization strategy experienced revenue growth in 2018. Personalized messages and conversations bring more engagement. Purchase recommendations, sample products, tailored marketing messages, and personalized offers for birthdays, anniversaries, or new milestones are few effective personalization tactics.
Reward Your Customers for their Actions
Everyone likes rewards. So, when your customers take a certain action, such as leaving feedback, reviewing your product, or creating user-generated content, which benefits your brand, you should reward them with special offers, sample products, discounts, and coupons. Rewards boost customer engagement and interaction.
Share Real Stories with Your Customers
Customers in a market with a strong level of competition do not only care about quality and pricing but also about the brand’s social image. They want to see that the brand cares about the customers and society; they feel good about purchasing products from such brands. Brands should share real pictures and stories of their community work.
Also, when consumers see stories involving people just like them, instead of influencers and celebrities, they feel a stronger association with your brand. Share your customers’ stories on social media, such as user-submitted photos and videos, testimonials, reviews, DMs, and more. Unpaid reviews from the average customers drive more conversions and sales than influencers’ posts and feedbacks. For example, Known Supply customers can read about the product maker and post thank you message for them on the website.
Show Real People Behind and BTS Clippings
Why did the Game of Thrones creator release an almost hour-long behind the scenes (BTS) video? To engage viewers! Accordingly, your consumer engagement strategy should bring a human touch into your marketing stories – have your employees talk or share short BTS videos on social media. You can also tell exclusive anecdotes. It will help your customers know your brand better. Creating a brand’s humanness feel and personality is essential. If you know other strategies that worked for your brand, let us know in the comments below.
NeuroTags Warranty and Loyalty engines help in increasing Consumer Engagement.
