Do you really know your customer?
Really knowing who your customers are is SO important but it’s also hard to find time to focus on this task. These tips should help.
Creating a Process
Creating an approach to know as much about your customers as you possibly can helps you refine your communication and marketing strategies so that you resonate with them. The more you know, the better.
Here are some stats you might find interesting:
- 83% of customers state good customer service as the most important criteria for their buying decisions.
- 73% of customers expect you to understand their specific needs and desires.
- 61% of customers would switch to a new brand after just one bad experience.
Spending time on this is most likely something your competitors are not doing so any edge you can get on the competition is a win. Create a routine and it becomes easier.
Website Data is So Important
Learn how to use Google Analytics data. This data is priceless. It connects the customer starting point (ads, organic search, email, etc.,) with what people do on your site so it can be a complete view of the customer experience.
Google Analytics 4 is a bit involved but you can use a data expert to set it up (it’s best to use Google Tag Manager for your conversion set ups) and then you can ask for some training or watch the Google YouTube videos which are excellent for education.
It’s pretty much like reading a marketing report once it is set up properly.
Sign Up for Forums Where Your Customers Hang Out
Forums are a place we go to ask questions and solve problems. Signing up for these forums lets you see what is important to your customers. Most forums provide RSS feeds so you can receive posts and updates directly in your RSS reader.
Ask Your Customers Directly What They Think
Use a simple, cost-effective poll maker and check in with your customers. Survey Monkey or Typeform allow you to create appealing surveys, then they summarize the data in easy to interpret graphs.
Motivate participation after a sale with a promo code or send an offer to your newsletter base.
You can create survey questions in your Facebook Group, your story, event page or in Messenger with Meta’s built-in tools. Survey Sparrow allows you to integrate surveys with your Facebook Pixel for deep data insights.
Pull Facebook Business Pages into Your RSS Reader
You can have competing Facebook business page content come directly to you using an RSS reader (like we mentioned above for forums). FetchRSS provides the ability to create an RSS Feed from public Facebook pages.
Bring Competing Website Pages into Your Feed
Do you have important competitors that change their home page frequently? FetchRSS will generate feeds from any web page. Plus it also allows you to create RSS Feeds from podcasts, YouTube and more.
Use Trend Tools to Find New Competitors or Untapped Products
There are many trend tools now that let you track all kinds of trending data. Find the rising start companies in your industry then analyze them thoroughly. See new trends in product categories or new markets on the rise.
Get Out There
Do you sell to a retailer base? Get out there in person and talk to your retailers. You can glean a world of knowledge from their perspective as well as their customer perspective. This type of knowledge in invaluable. It also encourages loyalty so your retailers continue to sell your products!
If you provide B2B services, randomly pick some customers and get on the phone with them. If you have clients that have recently decided to stop working with you call them and ask about why they decided to leave. You might just turn some of these disgruntled clients around with your sincerity.
Do What You Can
We’re all busy and we have to prioritize right? But ignore your competition long enough and you might find yourself in last place as other organizations race by you in this fast-paced world of digital marketing. Jump on it now and make it a habit as soon as you can.
