Today, I want to focus on what it takes to make a customer remember you. Having helped my clients save over 6.8 million dollars over the last five years, I’m an expert in what it takes to be successful in business, and my book The 90-Day Profit Reset is filled with tips, tricks, and wisdom to help boost your business and maximize your profits. Making a customer remember you is actually something I discuss in the book, and for more information, it can be purchased here.
Make a Customer Remember You—Don't Wait For It!
Before anything else, one thing needs to be made clear: you should be making your customers remember you. It's not your customer's job to remember you, and because of this, you need to go out of your way to be memorable. If customers did all the work, being an entrepreneur wouldn't be hard, and you wouldn't need to maximize your profits. While this can be exhausting work, the benefits you get from it will be worth it. Plus, it provides extra room for creativity and innovation in all aspects of business, from marketing to the customer experience itself.
As an example, I’ll tell you about an experience I had over a decade ago. On a Thanksgiving weekend, when we were expecting a sizable number of guests, the toilet in our main bathroom broke. I would need a plumber on very short notice on a holiday weekend—a tall order, to say the least. By some miracle, not only was I able to find one, but the plumber worked quickly, did quality work, and charged a reasonable price. A prime customer service experience all around.
One year later, Texas suffered an uncharacteristically harsh winter, during which a large number of pipes burst in businesses all around the El Paso area—many of which were actually clients of mine. They needed a plumber, and they needed one quickly. After the incredibly smooth experience of the prior Thanksgiving, I was more than ready to refer that plumber to all of my clients, except there was one big problem: I couldn't remember the plumber's name. To make matters worse, I had paid the plumber in cash, meaning I couldn't even find his name by looking through my financial records.
While the plumber did an exemplary job, he made the fatal mistake of not taking the extra effort to be memorable. Even something as simple as giving me a business card would not only have meant creating a trusting customer relationship, but also would have prevented him from missing out on creating profitable relationships with dozens of clients. Memory lapses like that are extremely common, and unfortunately, this means that outperforming competitors and setting reasonable prices isn't enough. Customers remember you when they need you, and the reality is that they're not going to need you 24/7. This principle of customer retention applies to all forms of businesses.
It's for reasons like this alone that going out of your way to make customers remember you is a major key in maximizing your profits. It's been proven that it's cheaper to retain customers than it is to get new ones, but if you don't make your customers remember you, you won't be able to effectively do either.
Make Customers Remember You by Developing a Plan
One study found that most businesses lose customers because those customers didn't feel like those businesses cared about them. It's here that you can take the opportunity to make your customers remember you by offering loyalty programs. You may have noticed that these are extremely common with successful businesses, particularly large retail chains with multiple locations around the world. This isn't something they do because they're so successful—it's one of the elements that got them there in the first place.
How you develop your loyalty plan is entirely up to you, though it does depend on the kind of business you run. If you find yourself struggling to figure out what would work best, do some research into similar businesses to see how they pulled it off. You could also hire a CPA to see how implementing such plans could potentially affect your finances so you can plan accordingly.
Make Your Customers Remember You With Newsletters
Newsletters, when used correctly, can be wildly successful when it comes to customer retention, and their multifaceted approach practically makes it easy. Not only do they keep your business in the minds of your customers, but increases the effectiveness of any other programs or events you may be running while simultaneously showcasing products you want to sell.
Weekly newsletters are great for maintaining contact with customers. Plus, with each one, you can add benefits like weekly specials, unique offers, coupons, and more. Massively successful chains like Michael's, Target, and Walgreens use newsletters to incredible effect, and you can do the same.
Make Customers Remember You by Engaging Them
There are countless ways to engage your customers. What grabs attention more than handwritten letters? Nobody else is doing that these days, and while it may seem like a lot of work, they showcase your authenticity while doing something memorable anyway.
It's also good to check in with your customers when you can. Again, it all depends on the type of business you run, but personally reaching out to customers every few months not only creates new business opportunities, but keeps you fresh in their minds as well.
Another thing you can do to make customers remember you is personally thank them for referrals. Much like the handwritten notes, this creates authenticity, strengthens connects, and generally builds goodwill all around. To be frank, there are no downsides in doing this, ever. A simple "thank you" can go a long way.
You can also make them remember you by going the extra mile for personal touches. For clients of yours, you can reach out on special occasions like work anniversaries. You'd be amazed at how far things like that can take you.
At the end of the day, there's no shortage of ways to make customers remember you. My book 90-Day Profit Reset goes into considerably more detail and offers even more ways to stay at the forefront of your customers' minds. One way or the other, don't hesitate to go that extra mile—you never know what you'll miss out on if you don't. Get out there, and make yourself memorable.