5 Steps to a Community of Fiercely Loyal Customers
Provide What a Community Needs
Are you looking for more customers?
It’s not about traffic or pageviews. It’s not about that wonderful word attention. We give cursory attention to many things and never act on them.
What we’re really after is a community of fiercely loyal, engaged and participating customers — folks who want to be part of what we do. If that’s your goal, these five steps will do what you need.
- Make an environment where folks feel they belong. Design it so they recognize their values everywhere they look. Everyone wants to have a home.
- Give them a reason to come. Make every ounce of content relevant and engaging to the people — living, breathing individual human beings.
- Offer authentic conversation and ongoing relationships. Let them know a real person is there to greet them. Leave room for folks to add their perspective. Listen more than you talk. Learn more than you teach. Customers will tell you what to do — We know hardly anything about them, but customers are brilliant about what they need.
- Provide what people want and surprise them with good things. Offer unexpected, exciting experiences. Let them teach. Let them learn. Let them play and . . . surprise them. Those are the things that make folks feel good about who they are.
- Be unforgettable, grateful, and more generous than they could have imagined. You’ll find that you’ll attract customers who reflect those attributes right back.
A community of fiercely loyal customers . . . no asset can outweigh the value of that.
Visit Successful-Blog to get a glimpse of what I mean.
Liz,
Great post on excellent customer service. Leaders who want to truly give their customers red carpet service will hire and train employees to do just what you listed above.
I love Starbuck’s policy of surprising and delighting their customers (no. 4 on your list) - I wrote much of my book in Starbucks, and was surprised a couple of times with free coffee packets left on my laptop by empowered and enthusiastic employees! I was surprised…and delighted!
It’s what I call - “Giving Your Customer Their Chicken Soup.” The more you personalize the service - and the more you strive to be extraordinary - the more your customers will come back….and bring friends!
Comment by Donna Cutting — October 4, 2007 @ 11:15 am
Hi Donna!
How nice it is to have someone care enough to get to know us. How much more fun when they go the extra step to use what they know to serve up a lovely surprise. Nothing wrong with feeling that kind of special. Both the giver and the receiver win — just as you describe.
Your book is going to be so wonderful. I can’t wait to read it!
Comment by Liz Strauss — October 5, 2007 @ 7:20 am
Thanks Liz! I love your new slogan! Sticky Business. Very good -can’t wait to follow your journey.
Comment by Donna Cutting — October 14, 2007 @ 10:08 am
Hi Donna!
Thanks for the encouragement. Everyone needs some of that!
Comment by Liz Strauss — October 14, 2007 @ 10:09 am