Building a Loyal Customer Base Dr. Featherman – with much content borrowed from Youtube VEMBA 10 – 3/13/18

#1 Build Trust Selling is a lot like dating, you don’t go to close the sale on the first few dates, you need to build trust over time Show your customers that you understand their challenges Show them you will champion their challenges and help fix them Show how your products/services will help them answer their challenges Be A REALLY GOOD LISTENER

#2 Build Credibility Be professional Demonstrate that you are an industry expert Salespeople should be the champions of product knowledge You need to be knowledgeable about your own products/services and that of your competitors You need to know the future products of your firm and industry Help your customers steer into the future with confidence Show in-depth knowledge of your client’s industry and their challenges

#3 – Be the GO TO Person You want your customers coming to you for advice and questions (not just for sales). If you are the go to person then you learn your customers needs before your competitors and you can innovate your product line accordingly Chart your industry’s changes and pending direction for your customers to reduce their uncertainty Perhaps have e ‘newsletter’ Be on your customers team Go to your customers when they have problems, help them fix them

#4 – Don’t be afraid to stay in contact Don’t try to sell every time you visit or check-in You will have non-revenue generating hours, but staying close to your customers puts you on their team and then you are the first to know of new needs and RFP may not be needed..you already earned the sale

#5 80/20 Rule Know which customers are driving your business 80% of your time should be spent on the 20% of your customers that are driving 80% of your business The other customers should be encouraged to use self-service ordering systems, product spec sheet retrieval, etc. Assign an admin assistant to the ‘less important’ customers

#6 – Sell answers and results Don’t sell products or solutions, sell answers and results Don’t be a sales person always focusing on products ..that gets old Be an answers person – that can answer your client’s problems. If you know your client’s problems and what they are trying to achieve, then you can provide results (via the purchase and usage of your products) Be innovative in doing research to cobble together answers to problems IE – no one wants to buy a drill or wholes solution, they want results, they want holes

#7 – Listen well to client’s pains and challenges Don’t redirect conversation to yourself and your company, let the client talk Probe often and deeply such as asking why is there a problem 7 times, it make be hard to peel back the layers of complexity. Many problems are multi-faceted, and hard to communicate (like the answer to the question, how do you feel today?) Don’t suggest a package until you understand the real problem Listen well and let them talk, your next product design may arise from hearing customers’ problems (in your industry)

#8 – Don’t compete on price You can never win competing on price Don’t drop your price, rather offer a reduced set of services, or a product with fewer features that will still fix the problem adequately If you take away from the price, take away from the offering

#9 Be able to answer the question – why should your client by from you This is a hard question to answer but it goes to the heart of the matter You should be able to demonstrate to your clients the differential benefits of your product or service So you need to know your product line and that of your competitors to identify the competitive advantage Tell customers what your products will do FOR THEM, rather than just what your products will do This is the same for managing your own personal brand

#10 Be able to answer: How is your firm different from other vendors To answer this you need to know market data and competitor’s product lines This is the job of the marketing department to list out the ways your offerings are different/superior and why these differences are important to each customer A nice CRM sytem would allow the sales rep to pull this info self- service Treat each customer personally, build a relationship based on solving their problems and enabling them to succeed.

#11 Again be a good listener and etc. Especially of criticism which is direct info needed for product and process improvement If you fix a problem that was brought up by a customer then you just earned their trust and referrals Happy customers will spread the word of your firm’s greatness Fix problems quickly (recover from product/ service performance failures) and give an incentive to encourage trust again Build value for your customers Shoot for impeccable, and quick customer service