The best part about owning a business is seeing how many strangers love and support your dream. It’s the validation that you’re offering a good product and the appreciation when customers return for me.
But, when customers stop showing interest, it can make you question your abilities as a business owner. Slow interest is usually a result of change or a sign that change is on the horizon. Here are some of the steps you can take if you’re suddenly losing customers.
Identify recent changes
Are there any elements of your business that you’ve changed so far? If your client numbers are dwindling suddenly, it could be a result of changes you’ve made recently. Whether big or small, your loyal customers will always be the first to notice something is different.
If you can engage your customers directly, perhaps surveying their experience might give you some insight into what they’re thinking. A business phone system will help you contact your loyal customers wherever you are. You can set up a talkroute.com virtual phone system that allows you to take and make calls from your office desktop, home or on the road via your smartphone.
Assess the competition
Perhaps you’ve not changed anything in your business recently, but your competitors have. The changes your competition makes affect your business just as much as, if not more, changes you make. If you can identify what it is they have changed, you can improve on those strategies to have your customers come back.
Customers will either love or loathe change. It’s crucial to keep abreast with what they want and need. You can adjust certain aspects of the business to reflect their wants and needs. Learn something from what your competition is consistently presenting as it might be the key to your success.
What’s the issue
It’s always best to find out exactly what people are no longer interested in when it comes to your business. Is it your products, sales, or customer service? Getting to the root of the problem is the first step to changing it for the better. If it’s your products, insights from your competitors will help you understand what your customers are looking for.
If it’s sales and customer service, there are strategies that you will need to embrace to ensure that customers aren’t chased away by rude salespeople and inattentive customer service. Perhaps you’re attracting the wrong clientele altogether, so you need to change your entire branding and sales approach.
Conduct a survey
Whether online, in-store, or verbally, it will be good for you to conduct a thorough survey of existing and potential customers. Ensure that survey questions cover the widest range of issues they might encounter. Ask them what their favorite products are in general and those in your catalog.
In the survey, ask questions about the areas of concern. There are so many areas that you could cover, but the best place to start is with your ideal customer. You already have some preliminary information about it, so a survey will just bring all those elements into the present.
Reward customers after the survey
Everyone loves goodies, rewards, a pat on the back or a simple thank you. You don’t have to give away gifts or anything fancy. Rather, entice everyone who took part in your survey with discounted offers. You also don’t have to go big here, just give them something to show your appreciation for their help.
A coupon or 10% discount will go a long way to enticing existing and potential customers to return to your business. The best thing about a discounted offer is that people will remember where they got a gift and maybe theu\ll recommend you to friends and family. With that, you have a foot-in-the-door with more potential clients.