The Four Stages of Dating (Your Customer)

Featured article by Berkley Bowen, CEO and founder, Cue Connect

In order to create a marketing strategy that builds a loyal relationship with customers, you, as a retailer, need to make personalization a priority. Understanding your customers and how they interact with your business directly and indirectly is critical in driving value, repeat business and, most importantly, longevity of relationships. Customers need to feel valued, respected, understood and treated like they’re more important than others. This goes beyond providing superior customer service, and involves communicating in a much more meaningful and personalized way.

Hubspot reported that personalized calls-to-action result in a 42 percent higher conversion rate than calls-to-action that are the same for all visitors. Using the information your customers give you to tailor their experiences creates building blocks towards constructing a relationship that lasts. Once a connection is recognized on both sides, the relationship will blossom into a happy marriage – here’s how:

The Cyber-Stalking Stage:

Just like any new relationship, new customers need to be nurtured and cared for but will back off if you come on too strong. While they’re constantly looking at your photos (or products) and trying to understand what’s different and unique about you – versus the other 10 people they’re dating – they don’t want you to know they’re browsing quite yet. A study from GE Capital found on average, consumers visit five unique retailers, three online and two brick-and-mortar, before making a purchase. While they’re shopping around and browsing, you need a unique strategy to get them hooked.

As the old saying goes, patience is a virtue. Patience allows new customers to take the time they need to figure out if they are really interested in building a relationship. Retailers that take it slow and take the time to get new customers based off of items they click on and share can start to build a personal relationship. The more comfortable they are, the more likely they’ll share valuable feedback and give you the opportunity to make your first move.

It Doesn’t Happen Overnight:

Like long-term relationships, converting customers into loyal brand ambassadors takes time. On average 48 percent of consumers say the most critical time to gain their loyalty is when they make their first purchase, which is why you need to offer them support when they need it, how they need it, at the right place and at the right time. As a retailer, you need to continue growing your relationships with loyal customers and constantly strive to understand what makes them happy.

Your customers are constantly telling you what they like from multiple touchpoints, so why not surprise them with special deals when they first enter your site or a present on their birthday – it’s the little things, right?

In being empathetic to your customer’s wants and needs, you’ll build a two-way dialogue that provides relevant, contextual messages. The relationship won’t be built off of one, impersonal touchpoint, but instead will be built on a solid foundation of treating them the way you’d want to be treated.

They’re Head Over Heels:

After a few years together, you have become your customer’s go-to. When they need something, want something, care about something, you’re the first one they turn to. Whether they’re attending a wedding or baby shower or just browsing after a long day at work, you’ve built a strong enough relationship that your customer trusts you to point them in the right direction of what they need.

This relationship is transparent, honest and, at times, critical. You’ve listened to your customer’s wants and needs and followed through in more ways than one. Whether you’re recommending items they might be interested in, notifying them of offers tailored to their preferences or letting them know what’s trending among their network, transparency helps build trust and leads to customer satisfaction and a happy relationship.

You’re Planning for the Future Together:

While the honeymoon stage of building the relationship was fun and exciting, it’s equally as important to maintain that solid foundation you have worked so hard to construct. You can’t forget the “good old days” when you used to surprise them with special offers and let them know about seasonal items you think they would be interested in, but instead those touchpoints need to be continuous and should grow more and more personal as time goes on.

It’s important to pay attention and foster the relationship you have built to ensure they don’t leave you for someone else. Always remind your customers you’re there when they need you and, once in a while, go the extra mile and make your customers feel like the relationship you’ve built is one they cannot live without.

Instead of spending time oversaturating your consumers with meaningless content, use the information your customers choose to share with you to maintain a solid relationship. By pulling insights from tools and solutions, such as Wishlist technology, retailers can create a layer of humanity at each customer touchpoint and understand what your customers care about and talk about with their friends and family. This can lead to higher satisfaction levels, increased site traffic, improved conversion rates, larger basket size and higher order value.

Berkley Bowen is founder and CEO of Cue Connect, a marketing technology startup focused on connecting retailers to shoppers on their path to purchase. At Cue Connect, Bowen is responsible for the company’s product and technical vision and plays a key role in creating and developing the company’s product line. Bowen is a retail industry veteran and entrepreneur with more than 20 years of CRM and commerce experience and a proven track record of developing innovative results-driven business solutions and leading successful ventures. Prior to Cue Connect, Bowen was co-head equities account management at Lehman Brothers and led the east and west coast large institutions sales team at Goldman Sachs.