Are you a little too obsessed with getting new customers? Very often companies focus on acquiring new customers. But some sometimes forget to look at the concept of loyalty. However, it is much easier to charge someone who has trusted you in the past than to charge someone who does not know you at all. The whole strategy then consists in solidifying its business. This is where the concept of customer relationship management comes into play. It is by optimizing and perfecting it that you will retain your customers over the long term and that your business will continue to grow on solid foundations …
Why is customer relationship management so important?
Customer relationship management is used to identify, attract and retain customers. Good relationship management consists of placing the customer at the center of a company’s policy. And by placing the customer at the heart of your concerns, your relations with him will be positively impacted.
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Thus, customer relationship management consists of collecting information and personalizing the resulting customer communication. Customer relationship management must be designed to increase the quality of your services and thus increase the retention rate. Especially since nowadays customers tend to be less and less loyal.
Customer relationship: less and less loyal customers?
We can now see that customers are less and less loyal to a brand. There are more and more new players on the market. Customers then have the choice between a multitude of offers and then choose the one that suits them best. They are the ones who are in a strong position, not you. A study conducted by Living Business (out of 23,000 consumers in 33 different countries) reveals that 64% of consumers change from one brand to another without any qualms if the first is not convincing and relevant enough in its proposal. It is therefore necessary for a company to adapt to this new digitalized customer relationship in order to retain its customers and be sustainable.
What you have to understand is that today, a customer is no longer really loyal to a particular brand. Rather, he is faithful to an experience that you give him. What does this mean in concrete terms? Well, customers are sensitive to personalization, but also to novelty and innovation. As a business, you must therefore ensure that you create a customer experience and relationship that puts your customers at the center of your value creation strategy. Only then will you succeed in convincing your customers to continue with you.
So if we summarize, the whole point is to adopt a customer-focused mindset that places the customer’s interest at the heart of the company’s activity (and above all else). And to do that, you have to be able to provide them with a very personalized and relevant experience.
- How to achieve such results?
Today, companies that perform well in terms of customer relations all have three characteristics in common. They are able to:
- Understand and anticipate expectations digital consumers in order to deliver the best customer experience and engage them over the long term;
- Identify and materialize new opportunities and areas of growth;
- Generate room for maneuver by optimizing their costs and the efficiency of their teams.
Customer relationship management in 2021 is clearly no longer the customer relationship management of 10 or 20 years ago. In this digital age, companies must manage to adapt to their customer’s new journey. And there are tools to help them digitize customer relationship management.
Deploy an omnichannel digital strategy
A omnichannel strategy what is it concretely? Well, it is quite simply a strategy of using various distribution and sales channels in order to optimally meet the needs of consumers or “omni-consumers”. An omnichannel strategy should also allow a smooth experience when switching from one channel to another.
An omnichannel strategy ensures that you stay in contact with the customer at all costs (because you are present everywhere). So you manage to improve your customer knowledge, to satisfy your customers and to build a lasting and profitable relationship. You can also build an individualized relationship by disseminating personalized actions through all the contact points that you offer to your customers (loyalty program, special events, etc.).
Which channels to choose in an omnichannel strategy? There is no right or wrong channel. We only advise you to use the new tools of the web as much as the traditional channels to forge links. “Conventional” relationships remain highly valued by customers and you, it allows you to keep a more “real” contact.
By opting for an omnichannel strategy, you will be able to collect a whole lot of data. Remember: knowing your customers better is the key to optimal customer relationship management. What actions can you then take? For example, you can do satisfaction surveys that you send by email to your customers. You can also call your customers and ask for their live feedback. Or, you can take advantage of an exchange on the customer chat to collect a customer opinion at a given time. The more customer feedback and feedback you have, the more you will know your target customers: their needs, their typical profile, their problems, their positioning, their expectations and the channels on which they are found the most. So you know more and more the journey of your customers. Your exchanges will be more and more personalized. Sales and communication channels will be increasingly optimized for your customer segment. And this is how your customer relationship management strategy will be more impactful and more efficient.
Collect and centralize customer data
To optimize customer relationship management and create an optimal digital customer experience, you must of course collect customer data. But to properly study all your customer data, you have to manage to sort all this data in order to identify the most relevant.
And even before that, once you collect your data, you have to find a way to keep it in one place so that all your employees have access to it. You must at all costs centralize your customer data if you want to improve the quality of your services and thus increase the satisfaction of your customers.
A CRM tool like Kpulse allows you to centralize your customer data. It collects the various data of a customer. Thus, you benefit from a centralized history of all interactions shared with your customers.
A CRM solution thus allows everyone to have access to customer information. Each employee can find a customer’s information in seconds to provide a consistent quality experience, regardless of the time or place chosen. What we also avoid: that a customer receives two or three times the same answer, because he contacted the company via several channels. In short, CRM software guarantees a good level of service, enrichment of customer information, personalization of the offer and finally, loyalty. With a CRM tool, it is therefore also the internal organization that is relatively easier. It improves the work of your teams when interacting with your prospects and customers.
Personalize the customer relationship
Nowadays, the use of a CRM is more and more common. This type of tool allows you to refine marketing strategies. Indeed, CRM solutions allow you to better measure the level of satisfaction of your customers. So depending on this, you will be able to develop different actions such as offering services or products that specifically correspond to their needs. Using CRM software to identify customer information also makes it possible to anticipate specific treatments that will have to be assigned to certain customers. For example, this may involve carrying out specific treatments for clients who represent significant value for the company (in terms of purchase volume, seniority or potential for influence and recommendation).
A CRM therefore also allows you to establish a much more personalized customer relationship. By segmenting the different types of customers you deal with, you will give your customers the pleasant impression that they are receiving personalized service. Customers increasingly expect brands to be recognized and to benefit from specific and unique treatment. Nothing is more disturbing for a customer than to have to deal with an interlocutor who does not have knowledge of the context of the customer nor of the history of his relationship with the brand.
Using a CRM tool allows you to avoid that. It helps you ensure a customer experience that is as smooth as it is pleasant to build long-term loyalty.
to summarize
More than ever, you need to put customer relationship management at the heart of your business strategy. Faced with less and less loyal consumers, you must think of new ways to retain them. Opting for an omnichannel strategy allows you to maintain a privileged relationship with your customers in all circumstances. Any customer-centric omnichannel strategy must deliver a personalized customer experience. To do this, you must collect all the customer data in order to analyze it and precisely identify the customer journey. To gain efficiency, consider bringing this data together in a single tool in order to share it with your other employees. CRM software allows you to collect all customer data and ensures a good level of service, personalization of the customer experience and therefore, quality loyalty.
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