A relationship of trust and loyalty with customers results in more revenue and growth for a company
By Nitasha Chawla
Tuesday, December 11, 2012: Whether a company is big or small, new or old, establishing customer connection should always be its top priority, and for every successful business, a well developed plan for connecting to the customer is a must, feel the channel partners. A relationship of trust and loyalty with the customers, in turn, results in more revenue and growth for the company. So how do you to establish this relationship? Here are some tips to develop a special rapport with your customers, shared by the industry experts, which you could share with your channel partners.
Customer relationship management (CRM)
This is a widely implemented model for managing a company’s interactions with customers, clients and sales prospects. Many organisations follow CRM to find, attract, and win new clients; to nurture and retain those the company already has; to entice former clients to return; and reduce the costs of marketing and client servicing. A CRM system offers benefits like quality and efficiency, cuts down overall costs and increases profitability.
Gain key knowledge about customers
For a company that works hand in hand with its customers, it is imperative to understand what they really want. Therefore, design your firm’s internal processes to ensure that communication with your customer base is optimised such that sharing information about the latest offers, new services or product launches will lead to maximum satisfaction levels.
Don’t go overboard with product promotion
The key is to ‘keep it simple’ and one must never over emphasise or overdo it when it comes to connecting with your customers. Also, do not keep bombarding them with promotional deals every now and then. This may annoy them and you may end up losing customers.
Form a strong customer service team
Having a dedicated customer service team that can be reached via email, chat, social media and the phone can greatly improve customer relationships and show your transparency. Keep your doors open for customer input and feedback to show that you care about each customer. Give them individual attention, and their trust in you will grow. Another important point is to make sure that your employees have a thorough understanding of the products and services offered by the company. There cannot be anything more annoying for a customer than to interact with an executive who doesnot have adequate product knowledge.
Design an informative website
Whether you are strictly an online company or not, a well developed website can be the place where your customer decides to use your services. Make sure to choose a website design that allows you to expand as your company grows, with the ability to add photos, videos and a blog to connect with your customers.
Some must dos for distributors
A distributor is in direct contact with the customers; therefore, it requires a special effort on their part to win clients over. Here are some tips to follow: Offer prompt pre and post sales service support; give a patient hearing to truly understand customer requirements well; maintain stocks of the products regularly used in your customers’ projects; have a healthy inventory of spare parts/consumables for the products you sell so as to save time at your customer’s end, and ensure reasonable pricing of products and services.
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Connecting with our customers is extremely important for our business. We do it through regular mailers on the latest offerings, technology updates from our foreign principals, as well as by inviting them over to various exhibitions that we participate in, round the year. We also visit them personally and keep in touch them over phone. This helps to provide with the maximum relevant information on products of their interest. These exercises also help in building the brand image of an organisation and getting repeat orders from the customers. But you must ensure that you never sell your customers any sub-standard product, or one that doesn’t fit into their requirements in the long run. Also, don’t look for any short term gains.
Sumeet Jain, director, Sumitron Exports Pvt Ltd, a leading distributor of electronic components and products
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Being in the capital goods sector, we need a continuous ongoing relationship with the customers, throughout the life of the machine, which is almost 10 years. Therefore, for maximum satisfaction of our customers, we need to be competitive with our service costs. We need to understand that a machine breakdown is our customer’s loss and not a profit for the manufacturer. At Juki, we feel that the best way to establish a connect with the customers is to follow a customer relationship management (CRM) system, which ensures regular updates to customers, personal visits by staff on a regular basis, customer satisfaction feedback, get-together parties, seminars, etc. We believe that once you have sold products to customers, forgetting them is a death knell for the future of the business. To keep in touch with customers, there is nothing like a personal visit; but since the customer base could be large, a regular update about the products through mails, seminars, etc, can be helpful.
N Chandramohan, country head (SMT division), Juki India Pvt Ltd, a worldwide provider of SMT machines
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Connecting with the customers not only helps in acquiring new ones but also helps in retaining the existing clientele. It not only gives you important insights about your brand’s position in the market but also brings the customers a step closer in terms of loyalty. Connecting with customers must not be misinterpreted as a ‘one way dialogue’ by a company, but should rather be considered as a platform for the customers to speak their mind. Repeat business, word of mouth marketing, and displaying a preference for you over other players are a few common benefits that can be expected, having established the right connect with your customers.
We believe that the best use of ‘IT services with a human touch’ is the key to establish a connect with the customers. This could include a mix of personalised email campaigns, offline publications and a visit once in a while. But again, this varies from customer to customer, as some may prefer seeing you more often than others. Not every customer wants to be treated the same way, hence ‘customer segregation’ is also an important thing to do.
Shiv Bhambri, CEO, RS Components & Controls (I) Ltd, a leading distributor of electronic components
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Electronics Bazaar, South Asia’s No.1 Electronics B2B magazine
