why you need to love your customers

We all get excited about making sales and getting deals over the line. But what about after the yes? What about making sure they remain a customer and you keep doing business with them?

Do the numbers:

• There’s a 5-20% chance of winning a new customer.
• There’s 60-70% chance of winning more business from an existing customer.

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Play the odds. The benefits of having an account management framework in place are huge. It should be a crucial part of your sales strategy.  Yet it’s often an afterthought or largely neglected unless a customer starts yelling or threatens to leave. Good luck retaining a customer who’s got to this point!

Building lasting relationships with customers helps sustain your business and makes it hard for your competitors.  Companies that do this well get themselves into a trusted advisor position. Not only is this good for sales, it’s an enjoyable way to conduct business, often leading to enduring friendships.

Developing an account management framework is not hard to do. Essentially it’s putting a bit of structure around how you organise and track key interactions with your customers. Typical activities include arranging for your exec team to meet periodically with your key customers’ exec to discuss performance, product or service development and industry trends, ensuring there is regular contact with the customer and the sales team reviewing the status of each customer on a monthly basis. 

Another dimension of account management is to surprise and delight the customer –send them an article on something they’re interested in (work or non-work related), invite them to a seminar or send them a thank you note or a good book. The only real cost of taking this approach is a bit of effort. The benefits will far outweigh the cost.

Play the odds. Look after you customers.

Watch our video below and learn more about how to look after your customers "after the yes".