• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Marketing Tactics vs Marketing Strategy
  • Advertising and the Major Sale
  • Niche Marketing

Beyond Niche Marketing

When you focus upon a unique target market, you improve performance while reducing costs.

  • About the Author
    • About the Book
      • Beyond the Niche
  • Niche Marketing
    • How to Identify Your Niche Market

Customer Service in the World of Web 2.0

May 12, 2008 by Kathryn Hendershot Leave a Comment

Many businesses tend to focus on acquiring NEW customers and lose sight of focusing upon EXISTING customers. The long term value of a customer is far greater than their initial purchase. Existing customers are the FOUNDATION of the holy grail of advertising…

word of mouth advertising.

One of the most frustrating parts about working with clients on their marketing is the frustrating fact of how intertwined customer service is with marketing.  Many small business owners say they WANT to leverage the power of word of mouth advertising without recognizing that exceptional customer service is the KEY to tapping into that elusive marketing goal.

Any business that expects to stay afloat by merely using advertising to draw in a never ending supply of new customers is doomed to failure. The cost of acquiring new customers is always much, much higher than the cost to sell to existing customers.

Successful marketing means establishing a solid customer base, then servicing that customer base as you add to it via your marketing and advertising.

Erwin Steneker at the Learn Good Customer Service blog writes:

This is a wake-up call for anyone thinking that customer service is something handled by a customer service department, provided by customer service reps diligently typing at their help desk applications…

Stop chasing that ghost! You’re beating a dead horse!

The time has long gone, where your customer service was the only place unhappy customers could go. The Internet is a common place to talk about just about anything that’s on your mind. Forums, social sites like MySpace and Facebook, Youtube for videos, blogs, customer complaint web sites, the list goes on and on.

These days, it’s much more likely that your mistakes are plastered all over the Information Superhighway instead of coming to you. It’s only human to get mad, and get even.

You need much more than ‘just’ a customer service department to make and keep happy customers.

Every time a customer comes into contact with your business, you either add or take away from that relationship:

A hearty AMEN to that!!!

If you think your customers are happy because they’re not complaining… WAKE UP!  Poor customer service has become such a staple these days that it takes a hugely egregious act to prompt a formal complaint from most consumers.

The first symptom that your customer service may need work is not an avalanche of complaints, but rather a lack of “word of mouth” advertising.  Current customers aren’t referring new customers to your business anymore.  However, instead of looking inside, many small business owners look OUTSIDE and call upon the marketing gods to come to the rescue.

Before you begin any marketing or advertising campaign, take an internal check first of your customer satisfaction amongst CURRENT customers.  Remember, satisfied customers will tell 3 or 4 people about your business… dissatisfied ones will tell, on average, 16.

Filed Under: Beyond Marketing Tagged With: Customer Service, customer's reasons for buying, the long term value of a customer, word of mouth advertising

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

More to See

Branding as a bonding experience

How strongly are your customers bonded to your business?

September 14, 2006 By Kathryn Hendershot

Way Beyond Boring: Advertising as fashion

September 13, 2006 By Kathryn Hendershot

Tags

Advertising Advertising 2.0 advertising and marketing for small business owners advertising and the web Advertising Effectiveness Affordable Small Business Marketing Strategies Beyond Marketing blog blogging and branding branding branding and entrepreneurs building trust business building business marketing strategies business owner creating a product for a niche audience customer's reasons for buying Customer Service free PR major sale marketing campaign marketing magic marketing messages marketing plan marketing strategy niche market Niche Marketing niche marketing for small businesses niche marketing strategy niche marketing wisdom PR small business small business advertising small business advertising solution small business marketing small business marketing consultant Small Business Marketing Strategies Small Business Marketing Success Online social marketing target audience the long term value of a customer transparency viral marketing viral video word of mouth advertising

Footer

Text Widget

This is an example of a text widget which can be used to describe a particular service. You can also use other widgets in this location.

Examples of widgets that can be placed here in the footer are a calendar, latest tweets, recent comments, recent posts, search form, tag cloud or more.

Sample Link.

Recent

  • Finding Your Niche Market
  • Marketing is more than you think
  • Features vs Benefits
  • Why you need a niche marketing strategy for your business
  • Niche Marketing Strategy for Small Businesses

Search

Tags

Advertising Advertising 2.0 advertising and marketing for small business owners advertising and the web Advertising Effectiveness Affordable Small Business Marketing Strategies Beyond Marketing blog blogging and branding branding branding and entrepreneurs building trust business building business marketing strategies business owner creating a product for a niche audience customer's reasons for buying Customer Service free PR major sale marketing campaign marketing magic marketing messages marketing plan marketing strategy niche market Niche Marketing niche marketing for small businesses niche marketing strategy niche marketing wisdom PR small business small business advertising small business advertising solution small business marketing small business marketing consultant Small Business Marketing Strategies Small Business Marketing Success Online social marketing target audience the long term value of a customer transparency viral marketing viral video word of mouth advertising

Copyright © 2021 · Magazine Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in