Why Customer Engagement Is Critical for Sales

When asked what is needed for success, most companies say – “we need more sales”. It is true that sales teams are the bloodline to any organization. But, it would seem if sales were good and new customers were being acquired, all would be great. Yet often things are not so good despite great sales results. Bottom line you must protect your revenue by also continuing to engage with your customers.

Measuring Success

Most organizations measure sales teams by the number of sales, demos & appointments. They are also, measured by the number of new prospects they add into the pipeline, the length of the sales cycle, the conversion rate, the cost of the conversion and the profitability of the customer acquisition. These are all great KPIs to track a sales team’s success.

At a much higher level of the organization, others look at the customer turnover rate, net promoter score, market share, etc. If the customer is large enough and profitable enough, then it may merit a dedicated account development team. If they do not merit a dedicated team, then they may be supported in a more passive demand-based manner. Passive is defined as “accepting or allowing what happens or what others do without active response or resistance” Ouch – do you really want to take a passive approach on a newly acquired customer? It is the opposite message that your brand & your sales team delivered during the acquisition phase.

Continuing The Customer Experience After The Sale

The most crucial part of the journey comes after the sale. It is the on-boarding, installation and use of the product or service. Let us call this engagement. If your newly acquired customer does not fully engage with your product or service, then they are at risk of becoming your next attrition statistic. This is true in Fin-tech, SaaS, credit card processing, telecom and all the new industries popping up in our start-up and gig economy. When a customer is acquired, you need to turn up the engagement phase and treatment strategy.

Most customers are not experts in your industry, which is why they selected your product or service. Likewise, you know your product and service but maybe cannot fully understand the customer journey. This is where the disconnect in engagement often happens. We assume that it is as easy as a download, install, plug & play or that no additional treatment is required since they already bought the product or service. Are you looking at the breakage points of your customer journey? Think about the missed revenue opportunity if these customers do not fully engage.

Consistently Engage

Sometimes it is as simple as a follow-up call or email reminding them to open the package, plug in the equipment, create a login, fund their account, or ask them to watch an informational how-to video. You see, if your product or service does not have your customers’ full engagement, they will eventually attrite. At some point, a competitor will swoop in and steal them away. At some point, you might even want to cross-sell something else. If your product has a recurring cost or annual fee, seeing the charge on their bank statement might be the attrition trigger. You cannot afford to ignore this critical timeframe in the customer sales cycle.

Some industries are riddled with high attrition. This means that no matter how many new customers your sales team brings attrition will dilute their success. If you are a startup, your growth could mask the problem for a while. Sometimes we hear, “business is great, we cannot keep up with the demand.” however, beware as increased sales demand has breakage points too. Bottom line you must protect your revenue.

In the end, it is a balance between the customers you acquire and the customers you keep.

Organizations need to focus on increasing engagement by any means possible. The examples are endless, but here are a few that come to mind:

• An account that has not added funds required to transact

• A credit card terminal sits in the box and is not connected to your network

• A new credit card is on top of a stack of bills in an office vs. an activated credit card in your customer’s wallet

• An accounting/expense software not yet connected to the customer’s online banking

• A downloaded app without a login and password or one not opened/used in a while

• A CRM tool is not being used by the sales team daily

• A customer service and support ticketing system bypassed by customers

Customer Acquisition VS Retention

The cost of customer acquisition can be an elusive number to calculate. The conversion of the leads that you purchase, self-generate through sales or digital acquisition can be significantly reduced if these customers do not fully activate, engage with you or attrite. Every customer has a preferred method of engagement. Some customers want a call, others an email, chat, or text with the ability to schedule when it is convenient for them. With so many products, services and competitive options in today’s marketplace, you must engage these customers in their preferred manner, early and often. Passing the responsibility for engagement to your customer will further decrease your retention. Instead, this is the time to get them excited about your product or service and reinforce that their decision to buy from you was a solid one.

Once you plug up the attrition leaks in your funnel, you will magnify the impact of the sales team. Engaged customers lead to referrals. . .but that is a topic for another day.

Companies like S&P Data Digital offer treatment strategies for every stage of the customer journey.

#engageyourcustomers