Are you looking towards long-term relationships with your customers?
When it comes to marketing, it can be all too easy to focus on making that sale here and now.
However, you can also use marketing to build loyal relationships with your customers. The result is lifetime customers who will continue to be a source of income for your business.
So just how do you go about marketing for long term gains?
Here are three ways to get started….
Understand Your Customers
If you want to build a good relationship with your customers, you have to start by understanding them. This applies equally to customers both old and new.
By using tools such as customer profiles, market research, and social listening, you can learn a lot about your customers.
What do you already know about them? What is their history (if any) with your business? Where do they go to find brands online?
Use your knowledge of your customers to build up a detailed picture of their worries, pain points, and what they want from your business.
That way, you can tailor your marketing efforts to speak to where they are and what they want.
Fostering a sense of understanding, and making the effort to retain that throughout your relationship with them, will build trust and loyalty.
Build a Personal Relationship
If you want to build lifetime relationships with your clients, use your marketing efforts to make things personal.
This could mean segmenting your market and marketing slightly differently to each segment, to foster the sense of understanding and empathy outlined above.
However, it's a good idea to take things a step further with your personalization.
Of course you can use your customers' names when you contact them, but how about marketing efforts that directly mention their interests, are tailored to their locale, or that talk about the specifics of their dealings with your business?
The personal touch means going beyond direct selling, too.
Contacting customers to wish them a happy birthday, or simply to check in with them and ask if they need anything else from you, will go a long way.
As the article "Why a One-Time Client is Something More" says, building a long term relationship is more likely to lead to referrals from your clients.
You'll strengthen your existing relationships and build prosperous new ones as you do.
Reward Customers for Their Loyalty
Marketing isn't just for gaining new customers - you can also use your marketing campaigns to reward your existing customers for their loyalty.
For example, why not run a promotion that rewards customers for their loyalty? You could offer a discount for returning clients, or a "buy so many and get one free" scheme. If you're a retailer, a loyalty card is a viable option.
Whatever you decide to do, build a marketing campaign around it that makes your existing customers aware of what is on offer for them. Use personalized texts or emails to make them aware that there's a fantastic offer with their name on it.
You can also reward customers for recommending you to their friends and colleagues.
As stated above, word of mouth is a wonderful thing for your business.
Make sure your customers know that if they get you referrals, there's a reward in it for them such as a discount or free gift.
By understanding your customers and using marketing to build up good relationships, you'll gain loyalty that will keep them coming back to your business.