Real World Ideas for Creating Strong Relationships With Your Clients

Happy New Years! I’ve been taking it easy this week. My copies of “The Little Schemer” and “Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs” (SICP) arrived Monday. I’m watching a video series from MIT that uses SICP. If you are looking for an amazing educational resource MIT has almost 2,900 course videos available for free. My economics guru loves their Economics series.

Family-wise my daughters were with me for Christmas Eve. Which was great! Christmas Day though I missed my girls was wonderful, too. Spent it with friends enjoying wine and dancing kitchen tango as the rest of my family was 300 miles away.

Speaking of family.

Did you know that there are probably some simple things you can do in your business to create that family feeling? The yoga studio I practice in does an amazing job of creating a family of loyal yoga practitioners. Friendly, caring, highly qualified owners and staff and a pleasant studio environment make people want to keep coming back.

This post is inspired by watching how they go about creating that family. Much of it is of course due to the personalities of the staff and instructors. They are just plain awesome people! I’ve been watching their business systems, too. There’s a lot you can learn by watching a successful system in action.

Important note: This post isn’t a review of the yoga studio. The business is one I interact with frequently so I notice how they do business from a client perspective. (Yes, I am a big fan!) I have no clue about their financial status or knowledge of their formal business processes, strategies, or plans. I’m measuring success here by what I am seeing in terms of numbers of clients, classes offerings, and hearing regarding from other clients.

Onward.

The studio’s pricing model offers some nice money saving incentives for prepaying. Which isn’t just a good way to ensure more predictable cash flow. It helps the clients make a stronger commitment to show up. And that’s exactly why I signed up for the 6 month membership.

For me to work out I have to be with a group if there’s going to be any hope of sticking with the program. Combine that with a 6 month commitment and, other than Christmas week, I’m going to get my money’s worth. (Even this week I’ll go at least once. My typical attendance is three times per week sometimes four.)

They also do some nice things when you sign up for their six month membership program. You get a few perks like use of their mats, water bottle (with an attractive logo), guest passes, and discounts on purchases of products they carry.

At this point in the relationship building process with our customers we also have an opportunity. When a client decides to make a longer term commitment they are telling you something. They like you! Enough to stay with you for a while. How can we turn that like into passion?

The basic idea is to be so amazing that you are the only choice that pops in their mind when a friend of theirs is looking for the services you provide. Raving fans can turn your profitable business into the only real choice in town. Right off the bat you want to make sure they don’t start feeling buyers remorse at from making the larger commitment. Reassuring them they made the right choice and are really going to get the benefits your promising is important.

Just like in our personal relationships, communication is important. Start the conversation immediately after the purchase. How do you do that though if you have hundreds of clients (or more!)?

• First, having systems in place will keep people from slipping through the cracks. The first step is documenting your processes. You and your employees know what to do to provide consistently high levels of client experience.
• Second, leverage technology. In the case of the studio, they do leverage technology with email newsletters and have ecommerce functionality at their web site.

A lot of businesses already have this set up or could very easily. The software is available off the shelf. You can install the software or even subscribe to a service that provides it.
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Ready to improve communications with your clients?**

Here’s an easy to do project idea for you. Does your ecommerce system send out an email confirming a purchase? If it does check the copywriting.

Anytime your system sends out a followup email after a purchase make sure the email is written to support the relationship you want to build. Don’t assume the default message generated by your ecommerce system is in any way comforting or reassuring to your new client. It may have been written by a programmer. And could well read like it was generated by a computer instead of a human.

Check every communication your computer systems send to clients!

Uncovering hidden opportunities.

What if you knew were able to identify both the frequency and level of service being used by your clients. Staying with the yoga studio example, who attends Gentle Yoga classes, when, and how often? Or who are the Power Yoga addicts? How would your business plans change as you identified patterns like these?

As far as delivering consistently high levels of service. Let’s say someone signs up for a package via your online store and like at the yoga studio shows up for your services. What would the impact on your client (and referral business!) be if the next time they showed up your staff was able to start a welcoming (or welcome back) process. Making sure they got their water bottle knew about the perks of membership or what have you.

Because you already have the information in the ecommerce database a simple query would be able to identify everyone to be welcomed. Likewise, knowing how your clients are utilizing your services allows you to experiment with what you offer. Test, test, test.

Finding a way to incorporate the information that already exists in your business into business can add value to the client’s life. Also, little things count, are remembered, and shared with their friends. Which translates into good business practice. A win-win for everyone.