Whether or not you’d like to admit it, every business goes through customer churn. There is a myriad of reasons for why you may be losing your customers, but oftentimes, companies aren’t truly aware of them.
While we’d like to believe that customer loyalty is a thing, research from an article published in the McKinsey Quarterly in February 2017 showed that when it comes to personnel care, customers are only loyal 31% of the time, with the other 69% of customers who are continually shopping around.
Since “shopping around” seems to be inevitable, what can a commercial cleaning company do to retain their customers while attracting new ones? Here are 6 suggestions.
Keep Your Customer Service Pristine
After all, a commercial cleaning company is in the service business. Customer service performance is therefore a factor that can really cost you customer retention. Educate your employees about what your company standards are and hold them accountable for delivering a high quality customer experience. Ensuring that you have clearly outlined desired customer service practices that are accessible to both employees and customers can really help keep the service shining.
Ensure that the Janitorial Services You Deliver are Always of the Highest Quality
People hire commercial cleaners because they don’t have the tools, products or staff to get the janitorial work that they need done completed. Whenever one of your janitorial teams gets to a job, it is your responsibility to ensure that they are fully equipped and trained to get the job done perfectly. People do not want to have to double check the work they paid to get done, nor do they want to have to call a team to come back because the job wasn’t done right the first time. In order to keep the customer happy, whatever the cleaning job is, it must be done with precision the first time.
Consistency is King
There is nothing worse than having a job be perfectly done one week and then horribly done the next. Customers notice this – and they do not take lightly to inconsistency, especially when it comes to the upkeep and maintenance of their commercial space. Customers want to be sure that they can rely on your team to do a stand-out job every time. Creating this mutual trust depends on you and the employees for helping build a brand that customers can rely on.
Highlight Your Strengths and Demonstrate Your Value
You don’t need to put down the competition to build your business up. The key is to make sure that customers are aware of what your company excels at. Be clear about what makes your company unique and how your team is worth it.
Keep Up With the Times – Ensure that Your Services and Sales Tactics are Up to Date
As times continue to roll on forward, it’s important that every part of your company continues to evolve with the times. Customers don’t want to be stuck in the stone ages! Ensure that your services, policies and even sales tactics are keeping up with the times. It’s important to provide efficient service that doesn’t feel like a sales pitch every time. Customers today want to know who their dealing with, so developing honest relationships with them only helps future interactions.
Be Open to Feedback and Have Strong Problem Resolution Plans in Place
One of the biggest faux-pas a company can commit is being averse to customer feedback. While nobody wants to hear about a flop, feedback is vital for helping a company grow and improve. Making sure that your company has a proper medium through which customers can express their thoughts is important, so long as action is being taken when feedback is delivered. Nobody feels valued when they just yell in a void, so keep up with feedback and have clear outlines for how to engage in meaningful resolution.
If you want to keep your business growing, you have to be sure that you have your customers. And as you can see, customer retention doesn’t have to be that hard or that daunting.
