The hidden cost of new clients

Every month, your client’s sales director shares a report, which has targets that may feel impossible for the sales team, directly impacts the customer service team, and for the rest of the company, doesn’t really say much. It’s the client acquisition target, and the customer retention target. While one would argue that more new clients is great, shows how healthy a business is and highlights the efforts of the sales and new business development teams, as with all new things, there is a hidden cost to it. Sometimes, that cost is financial, and sometimes it can be more sinister, affecting your client’s reputation, which is much harder to fix long term. 

Impartiality is needed when looking at a client acquisition cost. While new sales sound better and look good on paper, in reality, it can cost more in terms of pre-sale, onboarding time and resources to bring on a new client than to maintain or expand on an existing one. New clients mean bigger numbers and growth, but it also takes a lot of money spent on advertising and marketing, time for meetings, wining and dining, the hidden communication costs, staffing a larger sales and business development team and the administration cost behind the whole thing. New sales are attractive and much easier than turning around what may be a difficult client relationship, but they have to weigh up the costs of acquisition against maintaining those relationships.

When in doubt, talk it out

Client retention can be challenging. Imagine your client has a customer who is unhappy with their service. If they kept in touch with them, that unhappy customer could tell them what went wrong, why they are unhappy and a solution could be discussed. Rectifying their  issues can create a much stronger bond, as from the customer’s perspective previously they had an issue and your client fixed it. They were not given an excuse or placated, your client addressed the issue, and this is what all customers want. If an issue arises, take responsibility, apologise and offer a solution, not silence and avoidance. Inherently, customers do not want to switch service providers as humans tend to not like change. This works in your client’s favour, and since it is already in their arsenal, they should use it liberally.

Now imagine one of your client’s customers has an issue, does not communicate it but gets increasingly hostile because they feel as though they have been treated unfairly. This customer is radioactive, and could potentially hurt your client’s reputation as a result. Say someone asked this customer about doing some work with your client… Can you even imagine their immediate fury-charged response? It can be guaranteed that person would not be recommending your client, not by a long shot. This is the precise reason why customer care is needed regardless of the size or age of a business.

Is it time to review your communication system?

About this hypothetical customer who is reaching radioactive state, how did they even get there in the first place? Are your clients aware of their own customers’ satisfaction levels? Are your clients’ communication systems working for them or against them? Click4Assistance interestingly can help alleviate these issues. Customers will always opt for a communication tool that feels more natural to them, and in this case, live chat and social media messaging would possibly be their preferred points of contact.

Click4Assistance’s desktop dashboard puts all those messages from live chat, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp in one convenient place on their dashboard so they never miss a message. Responsive companies are more likely to have better overall reviews as their customer service is reactive and prioritises customers, making them feel important. And while we’re improving customer service, let’s gather some data with instant feedback forms built into the live chat, so your clients will have some real data from these happy customers.

Time to increase that revenue now!

Paying customers are said to be happy customers, but customers with whom your client has a personal relationship with, customers who know your client by name and customers who can rely on your client, that’s where the magic happens. When customers are happy, have tested and approved your client’s resolution system, and your client has been communicating well with them, they are more likely to engage in an up-sell item, generating more revenue without all the costs and risks involved with onboarding  new customers. Eventually, the customer would be doing so much work with your client that they could not imagine going any other way.

The same applies to your own business. When your clients are happy, well maintained and have a good rapport with your customer service team, they are more likely to expand the relationship, generating more revenue.

All of this additional revenue generated simply from reviewing your clients’ customer service system and making it easier for general communication and conflict resolution. If you’re interested in deploying Click4Assistance, the UK’s premier GDPR compliant live chat software solution and best live chat provider, to make your clients more efficient and productive for 2020, give us a call on 08451235871 or send an email to theteam@click4assistance.co.uk and one of our experts will be with you right away. Not ready to reach out yet? Discover how it works, try a demo, or better yet, try Click4Assistance completely free for 21 days.