Retaining customers seemed to be on vacation for a while. Sales people chased new business opportunities.
However customer retention has re-emerged as a hot topic. I hope so. Retaining customers is an essential strategy for business growth, expansion and sustainability: yours and your customers’.
Why? Because while the first sale involves sales teams, the care and feeding of customers, once won, is up to a mostly non-sales group of extremely talented and valuable employees. These folks usually are marginalized from customer-facing business development conversations until post sale.
I still cannot fathom why that is the case.
While hunters continue to hunt and the goal for sales teams remains killing and crushing quotas, current customers patiently wait for you to rediscover them. When is the last time you paid as much attention to your customer base as you do to your team’s new business acquisition strategy?
I don’t know about you, but my business strategy always is about winning and retaining customers, while taking very good care of them along the way. Sure I won a top sales award here and there. My customer retention rates always were over the top. Retaining customers remains the most important “sales” award for me.
If I was retaining customers, I most certainly knew my clients were winning, first and foremost.
I am honored to have written these blog posts for you this past month. From the comments I received, I know you enjoyed reading them as much as I enjoyed pondering this topic on your behalf.
Babette
#Sales Vision is more than 90 Days long http://bit.ly/29mS9b5 @babettetenhaken #strategy #collaboration
Why Tech #Workforce Engagement is Key to #CustomerSuccess http://bit.ly/29E8CLf @babettetenhaken #sales #collaboration
Got an Industrial #IoT #Sales #Strategy for Today? http://bit.ly/2a4d3Mz @babettetenhaken #collaboration
Client Side Experience of #CustomerRetention Efforts http://bit.ly/29NvWDT @babettetenhaken #sales #strategy
Gaining BuyIn for an Industrial #IoT #CustomerRetention #Strategy http://bit.ly/2a9O9ud @babettetenhaken @IBMServices #sales
How do you connect #CustomerLifecycle to #CustomerSuccess http://bit.ly/29QMBYo @babettetenhaken #sales #strategy
Communication Dysfunction impacts #CustomerSuccess http://bit.ly/29EnRmI @babettetenhaken #customerretention #collaboration
Time for a #CustomerRetention Upgrade to your Business #Strategy? http://bit.ly/29VQQlJ @babettetenhaken #collaboration
Marry a Cross Functional #Sales Team to a Client Team http://bit.ly/2aaS7GF @babettetenhaken #collaboration #CX
Lunchtime #Collaboration Groups catalyze #Workplace Collaboration http://bit.ly/2arC2My @babettetenhaken #professionaldevelopment
Proactive #CustomerRetention #Strategy captures Voice of the Customer http://bit.ly/2aaQ6ph via @babettetenhaken #VoC #sales #CX
Is Capturing End User #CustomerExperience a Role for #TechTeams? http://bit.ly/2aelq8R via @babettetenhaken @IBMServices
Babette Ten Haken is a management consultant, strategist, speaker and coach focused on customer success for customer retention. She traverses the interface between human capital strategy for hiring and developing collaborative technical and non-technical teams. She serves manufacturing, IT and engineering intensive companies. Babette’s playbook of technical / non-technical collaboration hacks, Do YOU Mean Business? is available on Amazon. Contact her here.
Leave a Reply