High turnover, high profits, high levels of repeat business – there are plenty of highs associated with creating an addictive and successful business. We are in an age where customer loyalty can be considered an urban myth, a thing of the past. With the rise of competition in nearly every sector, learning the key to customer loyalty can mean the difference between an owner making a wage and making serious profit.
Give them what they want and they will come back time and again and even bring their friends. Dont give it to them and they are your competition”s next customer waiting to be stolen out from under you.
For most businesses the value is rarely in the initial or first transaction – the value is in the repeat business that comes from giving people exactly what they want. This is what marketers refer to as lifetime value; what you make from the customer over the life of the relationship. Most businesses treat their customers based on the transaction value paying little notice that this person could potentially spend, hundreds, thousands or even hundreds of thousands over a given period of loyal patronage.
The concept of addictive business goes far beyond the need or even want for products and services and taps directly into the way people feel about these transactions.
There are four principles governing addiction to a business. All customers have a desire and are unconsciously looking to be given or at least offered:
- Certainty around how they will be treated and exactly what they will get.Customers need to know that they can get what they want, when they want it without pain or transaction discomfort. In this context pain is meant both literally and figuratively – the pain of inconvenience, aggravation or delay will leave your customers in the mood to defect.
- Variety in their experience and your offeringIt may seem like a paradox but in contradiction to the first point, customers also want their experience to vary from time to time. Even if they want to get the same product or service that they always get, they may want it to be delivered in a slightly different way or simply know that they can have it in a range of styles, shapes, colours and fashions – after all, variety is the spice of life!
- Significance as an individualCustomers, or in fact every person on the planet, wants to feel as though they are special or unique. When someone remembers your name, order or asks how your wife or kids are by name, how does it make you feel? Or what if you are complemented on your shoes, shirt, hair or smell? There is an old saying that has been well forgotten The customer is always number one, always. Give customers that feeling and you will be well on your way to having them addicted to your experience.
- Connection to something bigger than themselvesThis desire comes from a primal level. Humans are by nature a herd mammal. Just look around you now and what do you see? All people on some level want to feel connected or feel liked or loved or even just to fit in. And when we dont, we experience rejection which is the killer of business all around the world. Every day I see businesses unknowingly rejecting their customers purely because they treat them like a number and not a significant person of value. Even by not returning a smile you are unwittingly rejecting a person”s attempt to connect and giving them perhaps another reason to be poached by your competition.
