Show a little love to your most valuable asset

You’re a smart business person – so you already know the value of your existing customers. Although the precise multiple varies from sector to sector, typically an existing customer is up to 10 times more likely to purchase from you than a new prospect.

Despite this compelling statistic, most business owners completely ignore what could be one of the most valuable assets in their business – their list of customers.

Almost every business keeps records of customers together with their contact details for accounting purposes – but most do nothing to leverage this asset in their marketing efforts.

So, here’s what you can do today (and every day) to show a little love to your most valuable asset.

Take your list of customers and select half a dozen names at random. Now, pick up the telephone and give them a call. Here are examples of some of the things you might say:

• “Hi Mrs Smith, it’s Mr Jones from My Store Ltd. I hope I’m not inconveniencing you, but I like to try to call a couple of my customers each day and see if there is anything I can do for you.”
• “How can we do a better job for you?”
• “How can we make you like our service so much that you recommend us to all of your friends?”
• “Here’s my number. Give me a call any time if you have any questions.”

When you make the calls it is important to avoid any hard selling – particularly if you haven’t interacted with the customer for a while. Your goal is to warm your relationship with the customer and get your business back into their mind. It is more powerful to simply have a conversation and to listen to what the customer is saying than it is to pitch your wares directly.

And if you do this well – with genuine warmth – you will turn your customers into raving fans.