Tips for Attracting Long-Term Customers

One of the most important aspects of business is ensuring that one-time customers can become long-term customers. You need to make an effort to reach out to the people who give you business even just once in order to see substantial long-term success.



Here are some ways that you can keep customers coming back, over and over again:

Sell your company’s image. You’re not just selling a product; you’re selling a brand. Think about what it is your company does that makes it different or better than any of its competitors. What do you do well besides your product or service? The fact is, your customers can get a good product from a number of different places, but if you find a way to make them loyal to your brand, then you’ve truly succeeded in making them a long-term customer.

Don’t focus on the competition. Just because one of your competitors is doing something that gets results doesn’t mean it will work for you. Everything your business does should be based on the opinions and responses of your customers, not on what someone else is doing.

Build relationships with existing customers. If people have already bought from you, they’re statistically more likely to buy from you again. You might consider developing specials for “preferred customers” who come back and do business with you. This gives them the feeling that they’re “inside.” You could even let them in on developments with your company before you announce it to the public.

Work with other companies. There’s a natural tendency in business to have an “us or them” mentality when it comes to other companies, but reciprocation can be extremely profitable for both sides. Give recommendations of each other’s products or services, or work with retailers to advertise special deals for your company.

Do the extra things. Send out messages and discounts during the holiday season. Provide customer service that is helpful, friendly and welcoming. Go out of your way to do all of the extra things that make your customers appreciate the service that you’re providing to them. People want to feel like their business is appreciated, and if you make it clear that it is, then they’ll come back.

TeleDirect can help your company convert customers into return business with the outstanding customer service that we provide. Our helpful customer service representatives have extensive training to field calls and queries from your patrons. For more information, visit our website or contact us to see how you can get started with our services!

Best Practices in Improving Customer Service

It’s never a bad idea to aim for improvements in the area of customer service for your business. After all, your company’s reputation will be based heavily on the perception your customers have of you, and customer service is the most direct way that you can positively influence that perception.

Improving your customer service doesn’t have to be expensive or complicated; there are a variety of different ways that you can improve how you handle customer relations without having to make significant changes to your business operations. Here are some tips for how you can do this:

Hire the right people. The people you have representing your business in customer service should be reliable, knowledgeable and, most of all, personable. There’s nothing worse than having a condescending or easily annoyed representative dealing with your customers. Of course, one of the best ways to combat this issue is to make use of a reputable call center to deal with your clients!

Know your customers. The best way to provide great customer service is to know the personality of your customers. If you work with technology products, for example, your customer service representatives may need to take a more technical tone. If you run a nonprofit organization, your representatives may need to be more empathetic.

Use the internet. Online chat features, customer management software, social media and more can all be extremely helpful in gauging what your customers are thinking and in helping you to serve them most effectively. Some people simply prefer internet conversations to telephone conversations.

Be helpful. Even if you don’t necessarily have the answer your customer is looking for, point them to somewhere they can get it. Stay in touch even after the problem has been solved to ensure that they’re satisfied with the solution. Make it easy for your customer to back out if your company isn’t a good fit for them. All of these tips are ways that you can be helpful and respectful of your customer’s time and wishes.

Go above and beyond. Offer discounts or other special incentives, or attempt to solve problems before the customers even have time to complain about them. These are great ways to show your customers that you care about the quality of your product or service and their satisfaction with them.

TeleDirect has a great deal of experience in managing customer service for businesses, and our highly trained customer service representatives are passionate about helping others. If you’re interested in gaining a customer service team that follows all of these tips, contact TeleDirect today and find out how you can get started!

Why a Domestic Call Center is Better than an Overseas One

It’s a natural instinct for many business owners; when figuring out how to take care of your customer service, you want to opt for a service that will provide the lowest cost. For this reason, many businesses choose to outsource their customer service to countries like India, Indonesia and many other countries in Eastern Asia that have much lower labor costs.

However, it’s important to take more than just the cost of a call center into account. There are many ways in which domestic call centers have a significant advantage over overseas call centers, and all of them bear worth considering.

One of the most obvious of these advantages is the lack of a language barrier with a domestic call center. Many people who call customer service lines get frustrated when they can’t understand the person on the other end of the phone. The easier it is to understand someone else, the shorter the call will take, which means the happier the customer will be.

Another advantage of domestic call centers is the level of training that call center employees in the United States receive. Unlike many foreign call centers, representatives for American call centers undergo a high amount of intensive, job-specific training that can be specific for the call center that they work at. This means that you’re getting a higher quality of service from representatives that will actually be understood by your callers.

While choosing a large, overseas call center might seem more economical, but these call centers are also more impersonal and harder to manage. When you choose a smaller domestic call center, you’re able to keep up a constant stream of communication in terms of how you want your calls to be handled, and be sure that the information is getting to the right people.

Finally, choosing an overseas call center may not even be as economical as you might expect; quite opposite of popular belief, many foreign employees are paid only 15% less than representatives based in the United States. This isn’t a very significant difference, especially when you take into account the other advantages that domestic call centers can provide you with.
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With TeleDirect, you have a call center based in the United States filled with highly-trained and courteous representatives who will take your calls eagerly and professionally. Contact us today to see what outstanding services we can provide your business with!

Low Cost Ways to Market Your Business

Quite often businesses get so caught up in the intricacies of their advertising schemes that they forget to focus on some of the most basic, low-cost ways to market their products or services. Don’t let this happen to your company!

Keep these simple, low-cost marketing tactics in mind every day and maximize your advertising results.

• Everything that leaves the office should market your business. Whether it’s an outgoing letter, an email, a document being faxed, a business card or otherwise, make sure that everything that leaves your office and goes to other people has your business’s name and contact information.

• Promote with your company vehicles. If your company has a set of vehicles that it owns, be sure to place your contact information on the side so that it is legible and noticeable. This basically turns your vehicles into moving billboards!

• Give out free stuff. Customers absolutely love getting free anything, so take advantage of this. Advertise promotions that give free memorabilia to the first 100 people in your store on a given day, for example, and be sure to include your contact information on that memorabilia.

• Use “buddy marketing.” Do you have another nearby business that you’re on good terms with? You might consider exchanging brochures, business cards or other materials to set up inside your business as a favor to each other.

• Go online! Post on web forums related to your business, or other link-sharing sites. Use your own social network pages to stir up interest.

• Send out press releases. If you have any newsworthy information, send it out in the form of a press release in order to reach larger audiences that you might not otherwise be able to tap into.

• Encourage reviews. There are plenty of online review sites where people can give their thoughts on your business, or you can even have customers do this on your website. Have your customer service representatives encourage customers to give reviews about their experience with your business. The more positive reviews you build up, the more people will check you out! Even if you get negative reviews, at least you’ll have a chance to publicly respond to them and address their concerns.

Of course, one of the best ways to encourage customers to come back or new customers to check you out is to provide outstanding customer service. At TeleDirect, we have that covered. If you’re following these steps to increase the customer base of your business, take the next step and provide those new customers with the best service possible.

Contact us today to learn more about what we can do for you!