Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.
BILL GATES
will take about 13 minutes to read….
Customer Reviews
Reviews allow customers who have never purchased from you to establish a level of trust.
An enormous impact on buyer behaviour. In fact, if they weren’t so important, platforms like eBay, Amazon & Google would not invest so much in this feature.
Respond to all your reviews, positive and negative. Your response should always be professional and non-confrontational—no backhanded apologies. Keep in mind that you’re responding to the 100 people reading it, not to the person who wrote it. Your potential customers are who matter at that moment, not the complainant.
The best places to get reviews that will affect your business would be google reviews, social media, and product reviews, to name a few. Try and have a presence on local Facebook groups and engage with the community.
Negative reviews establish trust. Consumers perceive ratings closer to a perfect 5.0 as “too good to be true”. The ideal average star rating for purchase probability is 4.2 – 4.5.
The number of reviews a company has is also of great significance. It is more likely a customer will purchase from a company with 150 reviews and a score of 4.6 than from a company with 6 reviews and a score of 5.0.
Studies show us that most Australian internet users read online reviews. In fact 66% of respondents will read up to 5 reviews before making a decision. Sensis, 2017.
Furthermore, 73% of consumers think reviews older than 3 months are no longer relevant and 54% of people visit a company’s website after reading positive reviews.
Customers are likely to spend 31% more on a business with excellent reviews.
Source: PWC Australia, why customer reviews matter.
- Seek experts in this field and get your review management and ranking up and running across all platforms. I used the services of an expert to manage our reviews, and reply to them, and alert me of reviews that needed my attention. I had a strict policy of no backhanded apologies when responding to reviews.
- Never post fake reviews, as the ACCC issues fines that can be very costly. Individual directors can be fined up to $20,000
- Ask your customers to review you – you will be pleasantly surprised. I used to approach customers who had a good experience with us and ask them to review us. Needless to say, the reviews were great.
- The “goodwill” of your business automatically increases the value of your business. This is particularly important when you want to sell your business.
How do you manage customers?
You will agree with me that it hasn’t been a walk in the park to obtain a customer base. All that work in trying to understand your target market and conducting so much research has paid off. Now that you have it, you want to keep it! We break it all down and look at the following key elements on how to effectively manage your customers.
Communication is Key
It’s critically important to communicate with your customer as this is part of managing customer expectations. Using emotional intelligence is a great advantage.
If, for example you have delays dispatching a product – let them know. If you have made a mistake with their order – share this with them. You will find customers very forgiving – as long as they feel that you have extended that courtesy. We experienced two months’ delays in dispatching our product, yet we suffered almost no cancellations or bad reviews by emailing them with updates. Be proactive not reactive.
Create Trust
Getting potential customers to trust your business will be crucial to their decision to purchase from you. Things to consider:
- Good Reviews
- Flexible Returns & Exchange Terms
- Provide a landline phone number (not mobile)
- Open up as many communication channels as you can including downloading WhatsApp for Business
- Provide physical address (not PO Box)
- Create a business email address (Not a generic free one)
- Mention known companies you interact with
- Provide personal email responses, and avoid templates and auto responses
Create an Emotional Attachment
Creating an emotional attachment with your customers is of great significance. You can achieve this by simply telling your business story or your product story. Let them know more about you. Connect your brand/business, or product, to essential factors or causes that influence people’s emotions.
For example, a social movement such as being eco friendly or your manufacturing plant using power through solar panels.
Supporting charity organisations create a tremendous emotional attachment with the general public. They know you are real and that you care. However, be mindful of the difference between supporting charities to gain awareness and supporting them to give them the attention. Don’t use charities as publicity stunts. Be generous, be private, and the rest will follow. Your competitors will want to do the same thing – except they will brag. Thats because they are copycats and will copy everything you do. But even for the bragging rights of some, the charity organisations will have achieved so much, and that’s what matters.
Knowing your product or service for the purpose that it serves rather than the elements it is made of can help you create an emotional attachment. For example, an aircraft is not just wings and engines made from metal. It is a vessel that connects people to countries. It can also bring gifts to loved ones. It brings the family together when apart and brings people home when away. These critical words like “home”, “togetherness”, and “family” are what create that emotional attachment to the airline. Yes, a vital part of branding, but simple triggers make emotional attachments. You need to work these tools to master the art of sales.
Know who your potential customers are
Imagine how damaging it could be to your business if you got it wrong with a customer who has hundreds of thousands of followers on social media, and they write and review their bad experience with you?
On the flip-side, imagine how great it would be for your business if that same person were on the receiving end of one of the best customer experiences in their life. Learning about the types of customers and how to sell to them is one of the most excellent tools any salesperson or business owner can have.
Treat everyone equally and respectfully both in your personal and business life. Your customers can be anyone who you meet along your path. Even when you are on holidays! On my recent bleisure trip to the Greek Island of Astypalaia and Amorgos and through friendly networking I can’t tell you how ordinary every day people converted into customers.
Customer Service
Getting customer service wrong is a very costly business. Once you have acquired a customer, do everything to keep them. You have paid top dollar to get them. Their loyalty and repeat purchases are free, and their word of mouth and reviews are invaluable. Understanding the importance of customers is critical to any business.
We achieved a score of 4.8 on google reviews and 4.7 on product reviews. Through communication, we reached this and averted our share of negative reviews. Be Smart, not right. The cost of a discount or a refund far outweighs the price of a negative review.
Here are a few simple tips on what good customer service looks like
❤️ Treat your customers fairly – offer warranties and stand by them, don’t make excuses when the time comes to uphold them.
🤝 Resolve customer complaints effectively and politely. Your customers should not have to result to Consumer affairs, or the Ombudsman to seek a resolution.
📢 Get Feedback from your customers about what they liked or didn’t like. These insights help you improve your business and the type of service you offer.
👍 Be flexible in your returns and exchanges. (the more flexible you are, the more sales you will have)
👀 Recognise and give discounts to those who provide us with an excellent service in our community. Police officers, Ambos, Nurses, SES, firefighters and our ADF. They will extend you the same recognition.
Be smart, not right. If the courier company fails to deliver the customer’s parcel, offer a refund or re-dispatch. Don’t lose momentum on that order, and don’t drag things out. Remember, the customer purchased with YOU and their final review will not be about the courier company; it will be about YOU.
😍 Create a memorable experience for the customer, not just a product or service. This leads to customers who are happy to pay a premium, which will set you aside from your competition.
(Walking our customers around our manufacturing area and giving them a tour, was an experience they absolutely loved. Not only were they buying a product but they were watching how it was made.)
In a 2018 Report it states that:
Three-quarters of consumers say that customer experience is an important factor in the decision to buy – just behind price and quality.
Source: PWC Australia: The future of customer experience
📞 If you are an online business it is CRITICAL that you have a phone number (preferably that someone answers!) and email contact information that is responded to the same day.
A phone number is an absolute must that should be displayed on your homepage (preferably in the header as outlined in my guidelines of how to construct your website pages.)
😜 Put a bit of fun and humour into your communication. Your emails should be fun and unique if you have an online presence. Your customer’s experience begins the moment they receive their first email confirmation.
A professionally recorded message with humour will make the most disgruntled customer smile. You can turn around any situation with a bit of light-hearted humour.
This absolutely worked for us and I cannot recommend this practice enough.
The customer is always right! Meh…
We all know that sometimes customers can be unreasonable. We also know that it is more likely that you will receive more negative feedback than positive. This can sometimes be overwhelming. Always remember there is a “noisy few” out there. If you have 1000 customers per day and 50 of them are complaining, this can seem that all 1000 are. Keep perspective. Don’t take it personally, and always remain professional. You cannot please everyone – so don’t try.
💡Don’t take things personally. Removing your name from the emails will make it less personal. Signing off as “team@yourbusinessname” can be advantageous.
Human interaction
Human Interaction is an added advantage, and the feeling that you are a “real” onshore and legitimate business can have positive results for your business. If you are an online business – consider setting aside a few days a week where the customer can visit your place of business.
I didn’t realise the importance of this until almost a decade later. When we finally opened our doors to the public, other than an immediate increase in revenue, the personal touch added value to our brand through positive customer experience and reviews.
Let the “business“, handle the complaint and responses, not you. I did this in my second year of trading, and it worked.
Create a strong customer database
Maintain a strong relationship with your customers. Strong and personalised relationships are critical to loyalty and word of mouth. We created a CRM (customer relationship management) system that recorded all interactions with our customers. We were able to look them up five years later and ask how that surgery went as they had planned back then and how our product assisted them!
😜 I will also confess that we also made funny remarks next to the “customers from hell”, just so we knew to handball that phone call when it came in…..oops, did I just say that?
Be Respectful and Kind
Ensure your customers are treated with the utmost respect by all your employees.
Likewise, it is equally important to treat your employees with respect in front of your customers.
As well as a business owner, I am also a customer and I have abandoned a purchase simply because of the way an owner treated their staff.
Observe and Listen – Customer Feedback
Take the time to observe and even ask the customer how their experience was. Listen to what they have to say, just as it is equally important to read reviews about your business. If you are online, send them a feedback form or survey to complete. People love giving their opinion! You need to keep these channels open because many unhappy customers won’t complain – they just won’t come back.
If in doubt, take the generous approach with your customer.
Customer Loyalty & Brand Recognition
Customer loyalty and brand recognition are achievements that makes it almost impossible for your competition to capture your customers. Brand recognition and brand value are important intangible assets for any business.
Create offers exclusively for your loyal customers. Send them a gift around holiday season. Remember, it is always cheaper to maintain a customer than to get a new one. Loyal customers are free!
Managing Customers is step three in my 5 basic step guide on how to run a successful business.
Let’s check out the other 4 steps below and see more information on each:
It’s essential to understand these 5 steps and their content as they are the foundation of running a successful business. Practical real-business life information that every business owner needs to know.
I also have a bonus step on how to sell your business. I have included this as this can form part of your exit strategy as it did mine.
