It can be difficult to attract new clients. No matter how much you lower your prices or improve the quality of your services, competitors in town always seem to be able to do the same.
How can you stand out from the competition?
It’s hard enough just to stand out; to make those branding efforts worth it you’ll have to figure out how to keep the clients you do manage to win over. Strong client retention rates make the process of attracting new clients much less stressful. There will be less pressure: you can get away with fewer fresh prospects if the clients you do secure keep coming back. These 6 tips will help you retain clients long-term:
- Shared values
Most people believe that close interactions are what build successful business relationships. That’s not’s entirely accurate: while it is important to communicate well and maintain a certain level of chemistry, it’s much more important that your unspoken beliefs are in line with the clients.
The surveys don’t lie: a sample of businesses that claim to have a strong relationship with a brand found that 64% of those businesses believe “shared values” is the biggest factor supporting that relationship, while only 13% considered “frequent interaction” as the biggest factor. Clients will stay with you if they’re convinced that being highly-skilled, cost-effective, and responsive are actually your values instead of just buzzwords you use to sell your services.
- Be reliable
Even if your excuse is valid, missing meetings/project deadlines has consequences. You can get away with dropping the ball once or maybe twice, but if you frequently miss deadlines it doesn’t matter whether it’s because you’re disorganized, you truly don’t have the tools you need, or whatever other possible reason. You’ll develop a reputation for being unreliable and unprofessional, and current clients will likely get fed up and seek out a new partner rather than stick around.
- Get feedback
There’s no opinion more valuable that what previous and current clients think about working with you. The good reviews will confirm what you’re doing right, and bad reviews, while they may be a little tough to read, are even more valuable because they help you see with an unbiased perspective where you can improve to enhance future client relations.
- Publish reviews
Clients need validation from an outside source that proves your value is legitimate. It’s unlikely you have the resources to snag a celebrity endorsement or roll out television/radio/print ads, so you’re going to have to rely on your web presence as a more cost-effective way of proving your worth. This includes actively seeking out and curating favorable online reviews.
The numbers show just how important reviews are: One study finds that 88% of potential clients take online reviews into consideration when determining the quality of a business, 85% read up to 10 reviews, and 72% feel positive online reviews alone are enough to make them automatically trust the business more.
- Word choice
What is it that makes some emails relatable and easy to read, while other messages are unclear and sound stilted and disingenuous?
Well, some words are more persuasive than others. When writing emails to clients, remember that 4 of the most persuasive words in the English language are you, free, because, and instantly.
- Personalize emails
Personalization is another effective trick for improving the chance that a client actually responds to your emails. Just including the recipient’s name produces messages that are 6 times more effective than generic one-size-fits-all email blasts.
Interested in more information about how to attract and retain new clients? Let OffSite IT know at (866) 828-6674 or info@offsiteIT.com .
