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Artefact Team
Creative Graphic Design
Dublin, Ireland

Follow-Up Marketing

Here's a table that will make a big impression on you and if it doesn't, it should!

WHY DO COMPANIES LOSE CUSTOMERS?
Moved away or died	4%
Other company friendships	3%
Competitors	9%
Product dissatisfaction	15%
Indifference	68%
Source BT 1999

Indifference on whose part? The customer's or the company's?
Generally, having said that customers want to do business with whoever gives them the best deal, they're indifferent after that. Ultimately though,the indifference being referred to in this table is as much the indifference of companies to their customers as the other way around. Since it is unlikely that companies show indifference when they are trying to get the business (unless they're completely hopeless cases), it is most probable that we can interpret this survey as saying to us that most customers are lost because companies fail to actively pay attention to them after the sale. In part that may mean failure to provide good after sales service, in part failure to continue to market actively to them after the sale, and in large part failing to develop a good ongoing relationship with customers. Here are the results of a separate survey carried related in a post we read in the I-Sales Discussion Group (Oct. 1999).

A study on customer loyalty identified the following as the main reasons customers stay loyal (in order of importance):

1) Relationship
2) No reason
3) Expectations
4) Service / Support
5) Products
6) Reputation
7) Price

It is interesting although not very unexpected that relationship shows up as the key reason why customers keep coming back to the same supplier. But I think it is even more interesting that the second most important reason why customers come back is 'no reason' - indifference, inertia if you will. And as the first table shows, these are the guys who will, whenever anyone gives them a reason, depart. So the lesson is tie these customers in with good relationship management. If it is done in a caring manner, follow-up marketing is a great way to do this, helping to keep your customers loyal while selling more to them.