Acquiring a new customer is anywhere from 5 to 25 times more expensive than retaining a new one. Increasing customer retention rates by 5% increases profits by 25% to 95%. – Bain & Company
These statistics emphasize the importance of customer service in retaining existing customers. While it’s essential to always strive to bring in new customers, providing excellent customer service to existing customers after the sale is not even optional. It’s a must-do.
If your company doesn’t already have a comprehensive customer service plan (or if you want to improve your existing plan), I highly recommend reading Strategic Customer Service: Managing the Customer Experience to Increase Positive Word of Mouth, Build Loyalty, and Maximize Profits, by John A. Goodman. This book provides some great tips on how to deliver high-quality customer service, leverage the power of referrals, and build customer loyalty.
Here’s a summary from Amazon Books:
“The success of any organization depends on high-quality customer service. But for companies that strategically align customer service with their overall corporate strategy, it can transcend typical good business to become a profitable word-of-mouth machine that will transform the bottom line. The author draws on over thirty years of research for companies such as 3M, American Express, Chik-Fil-A, USAA, Coca-Cola, FedEx, GE, Cisco Systems, Neiman Marcus, and Toyota. Filled with proven strategies and eye-opening case studies, this book challenges many aspects of conventional wisdom using hard data and reveals how any organization can earn more loyalty, win more customers... and improve their financial bottom line.”
