You’ve certainly heard about the importance of customer loyalty, and the internet is the ideal place to do it, because it allows you to reach and maintain relationships with your customers in a variety of ways and at times you set.

Especially for those who already have an ecommerce or for those who want to start selling their products online, having a loyal customer base means ensuring a constant and long-term profitability for their business.

1. So why is it important to keep customers loyal?

Maintaining a trustworthy relationship with your customers is essential to ensure a consistent user base over time.
Strengthening the relationship you have with them will allow you to achieve important results in economic terms and give you the opportunity to open up new markets and create new business opportunities that you alone could hardly have conquered.

2. What are the advantages of customer loyalty?

First and biggest advantage: your old customers spend more and cost you less.
In fact SEO activities and promotional campaigns to attract new customers are in fact expensive activities in terms of time and money.
It is estimated that if you only need to spend 1€ to convince an old customer to finalize a purchase, you will have to spend at least 7 times as much to convince a new one.

In addition to this, the acquired customer who has had a positive experience with the company tends to spend on average 33% more than those who make their first purchase.
If you are proficient in profiling your customers, you can offer them new purchases, spare parts, additional services and other products that might interest them. This is why it is useful never to lose sight of those who have already made a purchase at your shop.

But the advantages of customer loyalty are not limited to this:
A satisfied customer who trusts your products and services and who recognizes the values of your company is inclined to recommend it to others.
If you succeed in establishing a relationship of trust with them, in fact, your buyers will unwittingly become brand ambassadors.

Through word of mouth, they can suggest the purchase of your products and services to their acquaintances, helping to increase your sales network.
By implementing this strategy, called brand advocacy, you will be able to find new customers without you having spent a Euro to convince them to finalize their first purchase.

3. How do I activate customer loyalty strategies?

What you have to do is to build a two-way relationship with them, so that not only you will communicate with them but also they will communicate with you, and to do so you can implement these 4 strategies:

Listen to your clients

In the real world, the salesman who gives you advice, the consultant who adapts the product to your needs, the expert who offers you a service, ensure that a solid relationship of trust is established between customer and company.
What you need to do in the virtual world is the same: show customers that you can listen to their needs and find solutions to their problems.
Try to create spaces where customers can easily communicate with you, such as livechat and customer care services, read and respond politely to their reviews on social networks and show yourself interested in solving their problems.

Ask for feedbacks

If the clients aren’t talking to you, ask them questions. Asking them to assess their satisfaction with your service and having them write reviews of your products are useful ways to keep customer relationships going, and they will be happy to give you valuable feedback.

With this method, in fact, you will not only show interest in them and understand their needs, but you will also have feedback on the effectiveness of your products and services.
By following customers’ needs and their advice, you will be able to develop new products and services, or upgrade existing ones and improve them.
In addition to this, having many positive reviews affects the propensity to buy, people tend to trust those who have had positive experiences with your company before them.

Keep your clients updated

Activate an Email marketing automation service, through which you can send targeted and personalized communications to all your customers to invite them to return to the site, to conclude a purchase, to send them discounts, promotions or to share news.
To keep them informed about the news of your company and your industry, you can also write a blog and participate in forums, make posts on social networks and invite your customers to subscribe to the email newsletter and messaging services Telegram and Whatsapp.

Always remember not to be self-referential in your messages and emails, try to speak little about yourself and talk to your customers instead.
Never forget that the goal must always be to involve your customers, creating content that can be re-submitted online and possibly go viral.
Use the most suitable language for your buyer persona and dress your communication with the most suitable clothing for the platform you are using.

Make people who rely on you feel special

Make your customers feel part of your company and offer them exclusive services that show how important they are to you.
Activate Customer Loyalty marketing services, point collection systems and loyalty cards, to reward customers for the long term.
Give them previews of new products, offer additional services and dedicated discounts that only they have access to.

Send promotions to create real customer retention and keep their active attention on your company and your products.
Always remember that for every activity it is as important to expand the audience of its customers as it is to retain and pamper those acquired, without ever neglecting them.

Therefore, loyalty strategies must necessarily integrate with webmarketing strategies to attract new customers. Only if you structure a well-balanced online promotion plan between these two elements will you be able to guarantee your company a constant influx of customers and a continuous return over time.