The Empowered Customer
In an era where technology and information have captured the world by storm, the “customer” has become more empowered. They have tools to get the information they want, more purchasing power due to various types of payment options, chance to browse through a range of products before making a decision and more.
Decades ago customers hardly had any choice but to buy what the companies offer and be content with other value added services and customer support which was given to them. But now, the customer is able to demand the best services, the ones that meet their needs and wants. The customer has become the most valuable asset for a company to hold on to. Basically, companies are in a war to win customers as well as keep their existing customers happy and satisfied.
Companies therefore have to make strategic level changes in their business and create new ways to retain their customers and continuously provide innovative, cost-effective and affordable products and services. A need has risen to move from being “business-centric” to “customer-centric”.
So how can organizations do this? Let’s look at how hSenid Mobile’s Loyalty Analytics Platform (LAP) is a great solution for organizations such as Telcos to retain their customers and make them happy.
But first, let’s see the importance of creating a “customer for life”.
Holding on to the Existing Customer
A recent article published by Forbes in August 2014 discusses how important it is to retain the existing customer base and how are world renowned companies such as Apple, Zappos, Disney, Southwest Airlines etc are making a “customer for life”. (Ref: http://www.forbes.com)
It relies in creating solutions, which could be any from simple to complex, but in the end would result in a loyal customer, who would repeatedly buy from the company and spread the word to others as well.
By taking a look at business tactics used by the above stated companies, Forbes suggests 5 steps to take to win the heart of the customer.
- Offer more to existing customers rather than focusing only on thousands of others outside
- Go the extra mile to give customers more than what they expect. They will keep coming back.
- Think about convenience for the customer, rather than convenience for the company.
- Product or service value is more important than its price.
- Creating a greater experience by giving something extra is not a cost but an investment
Next we discuss how hSenid Mobile’s LAP can help an organization to carry out these steps in order be customer-centric more than being business-centric.
A Platform for Becoming a “Customer-Centric” Organization – LAP
hSenid Mobile’s Loyalty Analytics Platform (LAP) is a solution for organizations such as Telcos to enhance customer loyalty and retention and to analyse customer behaviour to make proactive strategic business decisions.
With LAP, business users such as marketing managers can create real-time campaigns and promotions, target them towards the right customers, send out notifications and finally select the campaign winners and reward them. LAP uses an organization’s valuable customer data such as personal details, transaction details etc as input and enables the creation of customer profiles, campaigns, campaign rules and most importantly produce analytical reports with sophisticated analytical tools.
LAP also can connect to notification gateways to send out timely alerts to the right set of customers and winners of promotions. It also can be integrated with different rewarding platforms so that the organization can be reward customers with rewards which customers would really want, rather than with those that are thrown away. Customers do not want to receive notifications on general campaigns or promotions which they are not interested in. What they really want is to be notified about those that are of interest to them and which they could participate in and win! They look forward to rewards which give them value for the time spent in the promotions and campaigns.
With LAP’s capability to segment customers based on patterns such as purchasing, preferences, transactions etc, an organization can easily create suitable promotional offers for their customers. By integrating to many rewarding gateways an organization can give rewards such as loyalty points, vouchers, tangible gifts, mobile phone top ups, bank account credits and much more.
With LAP, an organization can focus on customer-centric business approaches, fulfilling the needs of the customers. This creates new streams of revenue and enhances customer loyalty, retaining the existing customer base.
