5 Amazing Ways to Boost Your Customer Retention Rate

Written by syedbalkhi | Published 2021/08/07
Tech Story Tags: customer-rentention | marketing-strategy | small-business-marketing | business-strategy | business | customer-engagement | customer-experience

TLDR Syed Balkhi is the founder of WPBeginner, the largest free WordPress resource site. More than 69% of marketers consider lead conversions to be their top-most priority. In their attempt to acquire new leads, they end up ignoring their existing customers. So why don’t you try doing that too and make your marketing efforts more successful and cost-effective? Here are 5 amazing ways to try out to boost your customer retention rate easily and increase your conversions for more profit.via the TL;DR App

More than 69% of marketers consider lead conversions to be their top-most priority. So they try to shift all their focus to attracting new leads for their business. And in their attempt to acquire new leads, they end up ignoring their existing customers.
But do you know that customer acquisition can be a lot more expensive and exhausting than retaining the existing ones? 
Acquiring new customers can definitely be great for your business. But it can cost you up to 5 times more than retaining the existing ones. 
The reason behind this is the huge amount of resources that are needed to identify, qualify and nurture your leads. And even after all of that, you’re not even sure if you can turn them into paying customers. 
That’s why smart marketers do their best to retain their existing customers no matter how hard they have to work for it. So why don’t you try doing that too and make your marketing efforts more successful and cost-effective?
So here are 5 amazing ways to try out to boost your customer retention rate easily and increase your conversions for more profit.  

1. Boost Customer Experience

Offering a good customer experience is super important to boost your sales, increase customer loyalty and improve your customer retention rate. After all, your happy users are the ones who turn into loyal customers.
So try to offer a satisfactory experience from the moment your users interact with your business. This can be through your website, through referrals, social media, or anything else. Use every possible opportunity to delight your customers. 
One way of doing it is to offer a great experience using your website. Most users make up their minds about a website within the first few seconds itself. And you don’t want to waste this time by displaying a blank page that’s still processing to load. 
According to sources, even a second delay can decrease customer satisfaction by 16%. If you don’t want that to happen, consider improving your website speed by identifying what’s causing it. It can be due to bad web hosting service, poor caching, use of heavy images, etc. 
If it’s due to a slow web hosting service, switch to a faster one. You should also consider optimizing your images, add better caching, use a Content Delivery Network, etc. 
Apart from the speed, your users also expect your site to be easily navigable and to have an easy checkout process. So don’t ignore these two important factors at the time of building your website.
Another brilliant way to offer a good customer support service experience is through top-notch support. Customer-centric businesses are more likely to retain their customers than those that are not. So improving your customer support service is extremely important if increasing the customer retention rate for your business is your goal.

2. Offer Recurring Subscription

A brilliant way to boost customer retention is to offer recurring subscriptions. People love such subscriptions because they are cost-effective and time-saving. 
Some of your subscribers might want to unsubscribe, but they are most likely not to do it anytime soon because they don’t want to go through the hassle of visiting your website to unsubscribe. Instead, they would prefer to continue paying.
And after using your product or service for some time, they start feeling more attached to your brand. So they would want to continue using it and ultimately become your loyal customers. This trick works best for products like groceries, beauty products, baby food, diapers, sanitary napkins, pet food, etc., that need monthly refilling. 

3. Cross-Sell and Upsell your Products

Another very effective way to retain your customers and boost your sales is by cross-selling and upselling your products. It’s a great way to ensure that your customers are buying something more than what they are looking for. 
If you have a physical store doing this can be super easy. Just place the related products next to each other on the shelf. This will help you attract people’s attention and drive some impulsive shopping. 
If you’re selling your products and services online, try selling two or more different products that people would want to use together. For example, if you’re in a clothing store, you can display a tee-shirt in your related items section when selling a pair of jeans. 
This technique works wonders in retaining your customers and increasing your sales. So think of the products that complement each other and can fit well if used together. You can also recommend upgradable versions if you’re selling digital products or services. 

4. Create Loyalty Programs

The next amazing way to boost your customer retention rate is to create loyalty programs. Loyalty programs are nothing but a way to reward your existing customers for making your relationship with them stronger. It’s also a wonderful way to encourage them to return to your business. 
For example, you can offer coupon codes or redeemable points to your customers every time they make a purchase. Allow them to redeem the point when they buy something from you the next time. 
But whenever you create such loyalty programs, make sure that your customers understand how to achieve those rewards. Explain to your customers why they have won it. This will help them understand that they can earn more of such rewards if they continue buying from you.

5. Use FOMO

FOMO, or the ‘fear of missing out, is a psychological phenomenon that triggers the fear of missing out on something that others are enjoying. Sources report that 69% (7 out of 10) millennials experience FOMO. And 60% of them make a purchase because of FOMO, mostly within 24 hours. 
So why not use it to retain customers on your site and boost your sales? Many eCommerce sites use this strategy on their sites by running a sale and then adding a countdown timer to highlight that the sale is running out. Another example is when you see websites highlight the fewer number of items left in stock. All of these work great in triggering FOMO to retain and convert customers. If you haven’t tried this trick yet, you should try it now.

Conclusion

Improving your customer retention rate matters a lot, and it’s something that is worth investing in. As mentioned earlier, it’s much easier to retain your existing customers than acquiring new leads and then turning them into loyal customers. But to be able to retain your customers, you first need to figure out why they have chosen to leave. 
Without that, it can be challenging to hold them back. One way of knowing the reason for their leaving is to ask for feedback. Send them a short feedback form asking why they are leaving the moment they decide to terminate their account. It’s a great way to know your user’s complaints if they have any. You can then work on them to boost customer satisfaction and encourage repeat purchases and brand loyalty.

Written by syedbalkhi | Syed Balkhi is the founder of WPBeginner, the largest free WordPress resource site.
Published by HackerNoon on 2021/08/07