Every business intends to retain its customers, whether it’s a person who buys or not. What is the meaning of a customer? That definition stems from the point of their initial interaction with your business to end the process of a purchase.

The buying cycle or the journey needs to be mapped out by you, as the business. How and when the triggers happen, is what makes a business successful.
It is commonly accepted that selling your products and services to an existing customer brings value to your business and increases your profitability. This is because you are spending less to acquire the customer and have value to retain that customer.

The customer who had either used your services or products understands the value of this and is likely to complete a purchase, based on their experiences.
We know that this is not easy to retain customers, so as a business, you would need to look at how you retain this and keep your customer interested. The most common use is email marketing solutions.

This gives your customers a regular update of what products and services are on offer. They are more likely to open your email because they have used your products or services. Brands that have established themselves have a more valued return, however, those on the smaller and medium business scale can achieve the same.

Building your customer buying funnel, will look at what creates friction and prevents a sale. For example, it may be that you are not offering a product trial or that your service process is complicated. It’s hard for a person from the inside to say what is wrong, so hiring a professional will always help you understand your business better and it’s model.

A business at times feels that they are doing everything it can, to retain its customers however there are areas of improvement to ensure you are able to retain your customers.

Customer retention through customer relationship management (CRM) platform

A customer relationship management platform, mostly known as a CRM, lets you manage a customer through a funnel of processes. It lets you retain customer data, so you can understand your business better.

For example, if you are on a serviced-based business and when a customer makes contact with your business, you want to understand how that process is managed. We take an example of a legal business where a customer makes contact to discuss a legal issue.

In doing so, the customer will tell you their issues and following that, you will take that customer through steps to resolve that issue.

During this process, having a legal CRM platform will let you understand the buying process so that you can make improvements on ensuring the customer retention value is maintained. Not all customers will turn into a transactional process, so where there are gaps of loss, you will be able to analyse this.

A very good end-to-end solution is the Hybrid Legal CRM. As with any CRM, its benefits from how the lead is managed, so that is when the customer is making an enquiry and trying to understand if you are the right fit for their issue.

Then the matter management, so to meet your regulatory compliance, works to achieve this. The Hybrid Legal CRM comes with a number of great features.

It lets you manage your email mailbox linking to enquiries and your matters in a simple form. You can build email automation, so when a customer makes an enquiry, they are sent personalised emails rather than a generic email saying something that does not interest them at all, so your improving customer retention.

Finally, the opportunity lead management, which looks at how you can sell other services and build on retention. Not many CRM are similar to the Hybrid Legal CRM because either they are lead generation tools or only work to manage a matter.

Understanding your customer segments through careful metrics

A marketing process is to understand your customer segments. You need to be able to understand your customer targets, which would help you retain your customers.

Retaining your customers is not simply when a transaction completes between you and the customer but when a customer interacts with your business.

Most frequently asked questions

Here are some questions we have put together to help answer the most frequently asked questions related to customer retention and CRM.

Why is it important to improve customer lifetime value?

Improving this would in turn improve the business profitability. However, it is more than that as well. As a business, bringing value to your customers on the product or services you offer, and retaining the existing customers, is about being a good business.

Better customer experience through the product sale or service sale improves retaining your customers. Investing in understanding your customer retention is very important.

What are the costs to acquire a customer (CAC)?

Through your metric, you will be able to understand and identify the costs related to acquiring a customer.

This is an important element of your business so that you can understand what would cost to acquire a customer and the costs to retain them once they have become a paying customer.

Creating a customer lifetime value model

It’s important you create a customer value model so that you can understand the funnel of the process.

You will be able to identify what works and what does not. It helps your employees understand the process to follow to retain and improve on customer retention.

How can I improve my customer onboarding process?

It’s the relationship between you and your customer. The better the relationship, the easier the sale process can work.

Learn how to upsell and also how to deliver better product or service awareness, which would help in the onboarding process.

Does email automation work?

Yes, it does but has to be personalised because a customer does not want an email that does not interest them.

You need to put yourself into the shoes of the customer and understand what would trigger them to make contact and move forward with the purchase of a product or service.

Does improving customer service experience matter?

Yes it does. Customer service regardless of whether you’re selling a product or service is vital to your business. The customer experience brings value to bring more customers, who would be able to share with friends and family.

Need our advice or help, contact us at info@techics.com or speak to one of our friendly professionals at 0207 237 3388.