We’ve all read or heard over and over again that it costs a lot more to acquire a customer than it does to retain an existing one.
And yet, companies all too often behave as though they don’t really care about their customers or haven’t thought through the math involved in courting and landing prospects. At least this is the premise of Robert Fleming, CEO of the eMarketing Association And I agree with him.
In a recent email I received from the LinkedIn group, the eMarketing Association Network, Mr. Fleming talks about what turns customer off, actions that demonstrate “utter contempt” for them. Among the examples he mentions: emails you shouldn’t reply to because they’re not monitored or long, annoying-to-navigate automated voice response systems. The most important point he makes during his mini-rant is that when companies do this kind of thing, they lose an opportunity to engage their customers and strengthen the relationship with them.
Frankly, it’s not cheap to stay in contact with customers. It costs to maintain an email system that someone actually monitors or a contact center where someone picks up the phone and is prepared to help. The worst experience I’ve had recently was where I responded—as directed—to an email from a customer service rep, only to have it bounce back, because the address was invalid. Not confidence-inspiring when you’re having a problem…
I think that many companies are trying to do the right thing, while also cutting costs. Too often, though, their efforts seem like poor compromises. If so many other organizations weren’t doing the same thing, they’d probably be losing more customers.