|
|
Referral Marketing Blogs
 Appreciate Your Customers and They Will Appreciate You
With More Referrals, Sales and Loyalty
It’s mid October and only a few weeks to Christmas, a good time of year to show appreciation to your customers for their business. But why do your ask? After all you give your customers the usual good service, annual hospitality and Christmas cards, that’s enough isn’t it?
Here’s a good question, how many times do your suppliers show you their “personal” and sincere appreciation of your business?
Not many I think, how would you feel if they wrote to you stating “Thanks for your business for 2007” etc, no doubt you would think much better of them for showing their appreciation and would certainly wish to continue your relationship with them and refer them extensively. So what is to stop you doing the same with your own customers?
There are several benefits for you and your business in conducting a simple annual “Thank You for Your Business Letter” NOT AN EMAIL. They are simply and easy to do, low cost, takes little time, gains high appreciation, satisfaction and loyalty from customers and also offers the potential to obtain customer feed back data.
I generally send such a letter annually, preferably just prior to the Christmas season or just after the New Year. Either is good and you can do it on both occasions using different message formats i.e. “Thank You” format for pass business and a “Appreciated Format” for anticipated business for the forthcoming year.
Such a letter could be based on the following template;
“Dear John
THANK YOU FOR BEING A VALUED CLIENT AND FOR YOUR BUSINESS IN 2007
I hope this letter finds you well and that business is good.
I am writing to thank you for your business in 2007. We appreciate you using our company and we hope you are pleased with the results of our services and any benefits and value we provide to JS Industries.
We wish to maximise the standards of our services to all our clients and we would greatly appreciate your feedback, ideas and input on how we achieve this aim. We have enclosed a simple customer survey form for this purpose.
To further show our appreciation we have enclosed some high value special offer vouchers from top quality alliance partners and Christmas suppliers who include; jewellers, restaurants, gift, clothes, shoe shops, travel agents etc.
We hope you have a really great festive season and a prosperous New Year.
Best regards,
Etc…..
Note adding the high quality vouchers (which will not cost you anything) gives greater value to your letter.
I guarantee if you send out a letter of appreciation it would be well received by your customers who would like it and rate you highly. This small gesture will help to increase referrals, sales, profits, satisfaction, loyalty and business growth.
**************************
Using Referral Marketing Strategies to Greatly Increase Your Profits
There are many ways you can improve your profit margin. As marketing costs can take up a sizable amount of a company’s expense budget, it will also affect your bottom line. Here are some ideas on how you can use nil/low cost, high response referral marketing to help achieve your best profit margin and return on investment (ROI) from marketing.
In this very competitive world, traditional marketing such as advertising, direct mail, direct sales, telesales, events etc. is getting increasing expensive and becoming very ineffective with a bad return on marketing investment.
Marketing strategies that still work well is the Internet, then word of mouth is almost top, where 80% of companies get 70% of their business through referrals from satisfied customers. The bad news about word of mouth referrals is that they are gained spontaneously and without any form of strategy programme.
The most effective, powerful and lowest cost marketing strategy EVER is referral marketing, yet there are only a tiny number of companies who are savvy enough in using this incredible low cost/high result marketing concept.
In brief referral marketing takes word of mouth to its highest level. It is a very proactive, structured and systematic process, which educates, informs, encourages and rewards customers to think and talk more about you, your company and its products and services.
The benefits from referral marketing for any type and size of company are many. Apart from gaining more business, customer loyalty and reducing competition, a major and important benefit from referral marketing is increasing your profit margin.
This is achieved many ways which include;
Obtaining many warm referral leads via satisfied customers generally costs you little or nothing to gain, saving you money and increasing your margin.
“Educating” your customers of the credibility, benefits and value of your products and services you provide. Customers will be more willing to pay a premium price for an important product or service, if they clearly understand the benefits and value they are getting and think they are getting best value for their money. Premium prices = greater profit.
It is a fact that most companies only get approx. 40% of the business they could be getting, so there is plenty of scope for up-sales, which cost little or nothing to achieve from existing satisfied customers. Up-sales = highest profits.
Having testimonials and successful case studies from satisfied customers helps to establish your credentials and worth, especially if there are endorsed statements where you have helped customers to increased income, save money, time, convenience etc. Such endorsements and successful achievements can justify again asking for a premium rate increasing your bottom line.
You can further increase justification for higher prices if you develop close customer relationships, the best customer care service, a referral programme, a guarantee, added value and customer appreciation.
Referred customers tend to become very productive referrers themselves, which continues your business growth and worth at zero / minimum cost long-term, the best kind of business.
Price is less of an issue with referred customers due to the “endorsement factor” and if you operate in a niche market with a unique and/or specialist product or service, again this increases the benefits and value you give and allows you to charge accordingly.
In conclusion; these are just a few of many powerful low cost ways you can greatly improve your profit margin and bottom line using referral marketing strategies. When combined in a structured and systematic process, the benefits and value in increasing your profit return are just incredible.
Calculate how referral marketing can help your business with the Referral Marketing Calculator: To see how much potential referral business you can gain through having your own referral marketing programme go to http://www.goldnetreferralmarketing.co.uk/calculator.php
|
|
