Customer Loyalty – Obey the King for YOUR success!!!

Time and again, we have all heard it numerous times, that – “Customer is the King!!!” This saying is also backed by comments like “If we don’t take care of our customers, someone else will”.

Well, both the statements are true for any organisation and any organisation who has been in the market long enough, have all experienced how fast customers change their preferences and taste. Keeping track of Customer behavior is the major challenge and today all big brands are focusing on this platform to keep the customer engagement high. Apparently to retain the Customers.

Why is it so important to listen to your customers? Think for a while how many customers do you have? Yes millions….And Each of them are different. Then does this exercise actually help? A recent study by an American Fast food company revealed that customers who are members of the loyalty program order from them about 33 percent more frequently than those who haven’t joined yet.

But why are the customers so distracted that all brands loose their customers the moment they go low on engagement. To answer that we should understand the complexities of today’s market. As a student of business management, my text books taught me that the cycle in which a customer align with a brand are as following:

• Awareness or advertising
• Interest – created by the information shared
• Evaluation
• Commitment
• Loyalty

Today, this concept is buried in Jurassic park. Today The Customer looks like this:

Customers have access to Brands everywhere today, be it when they are relaxing at home or in the hurry while travelling. Internet and smart apps have bridged all geographies and access to the physical store doesn’t really matter today. 

So how do one keep a customer brand loyal. Its very important to understand the customer’s buying behavior here and cater to them as required. About 40-60% of customers within the demographics of 16-26 years are spontaneous buyers where as the customers belonging to the age group of 30+ are research oriented buyers. 

For both these customers active visibility at their preferred locations are extremely critical. In order to do that, one has to be extremely thorough with the source which basically helps the customer to make the buying decision. This actually follows this cycle and here is what you should understand:

• Idea – Know what your customer thinks and understand that these are intrinsic triggers.
• Research – Have the right mix of information that your customers are looking for and at the right places
• Decision – This is extremely critical. This is where both worlds meet. One who has strongest of information and impulsive content, definitely wins. 
• Transaction & Purchase – Give value for the price and even deliver it to The King’s Palace, but smoothly.
• Support and retain – Give value to your customer. Make him feel how important it is for you to have him as one.

You must have be familiar with “Money makes money”….well, a happy customer also creates many customers for you. So it again comes down the same challenge, how do you keep your customers loyal and engaged with the brand. Here are a few things that one can practice to achieve this:

• Create relevance – Know your process. Build a strong team of Customer analytic and Customer relations who inputs customer data into into system at regular intervals and keeps your relationship with your customer fresh and strong.

• Know your customer and know them the best [At least the best you can] – Periodically its important for every brand to derive intelligence from the focus group. Doing customer segmentation and periodic surveys and inputs from these groups can have strong inputs to shape your business intelligence. Today this should also be practiced through web analytics of different online properties that a brand holds.

• Share your customer stories – Like every event in life, every customer to a brand, leaves a mark for your business. It is important to share your customer experiences and integrate your promotional channels with them. With this you also need to track the conversations and create a connected brand experience.

Indeed in today’s marketing the shortest distance between two points is NOT straight line anymore….So, Good Luck!!!