What is a business without its customers?

One way of measuring a business’s success is how they handle customer feedback and criticism. Customer strength can make or break any business.

Why Is It Important To Know the Customer?

It is extremely important to understand customer behavior because you can provide better business and build strong relationships.

A satisfied client can lead to more clients, and the chain goes on. It may sound easy, but it takes time to figure out buyer psyche and shopping patterns. Here are some ways to make an analysis:

  • Keep a check on your website analytics data, as it will give you a proper insight on the products or services customers are looking at, what pages they spent the most time on, and what they’re buying.
  • Collect statistics based on age, geographical location, purchase frequency and segregate accordingly.
  • Engage with customers through meaningful social media campaigns, surveying clients. Answer their questions and offer quick solutions.
  • Create surveys and have customers fill them to gather more data.

What Good Customer Reviews Can Do For Your Business

There are several reasons why reviews have become so important these days. They not only affect business sales and profits but are also responsible for its existence, to an extent.

  • Reviews affect search engine rankings: Social media platforms and search engines index fresh content where people often end up looking for reviews. Regular feedback will pump SEO rankings for your brand.
  • Quality reviews bring more traffic: Shoppers are willing to trust well-written reviews even by strangers. This helps create trust between customers and the business.
  • Customers spread the word about you: Asking customers to share their shopping experience on review sites can help with business expansion and brand awareness.
  • Reviews help with decision-making: One’s experience influences the other’s purchase decision. That’s why we now have social media superstars who people look up to, especially when shopping.
  • Are a chance for customer retention: A happy customer will leave a good review, and there are high chances of return.
  • Highlight weaknesses in your business: Let's face it we all want glowing 5 star reviews on every site, but in reality there may be a few instances where the customer was not happy with the experience. This reviewing and responding to negative reviews allows for you to understand the customer perspective and make changes accordingly. Also, by responding to your negative review and offering to make right (if possible) shows that you care about your customers and their experience with your company.

How to Positively Handle Negative Feedback

It’s quite normal for even the best of brands to receive negative reviews at times. These tips will help ease the situation.

  • The first thing to remember about negative feedback is that it’s not a personal attack
  • Someone took the time to talk about their experience, even if not good. Take it as an opportunity to improve your product/service
  • Promptly respond to customers’ complaints in a respectful manner
  • Be kind and explain to the customer if their review was unjustified
  • NEVER ignore negative feedback - negative feedback is sometimes the most important feedback your business will receive.

Always Keep Your Customers in Mind

The saying "Customer is the King." has proven an ideal mantra for many big businesses out there. For some entrepreneurs, a customer-centric marketing approach is the best way to expand a business, and it is correct to some extent. Always keeping your customer in mind is vital to a successful business!

Share with me your tips and how learn from your customers on my social channels - TwitterFacebookLinkedIn, or Instagram. Use #customers

About the Author, James Webster

James Webster, founder and Executive Chairman of ROK Financial has almost two decades of experience within the financial services industry. His passion for helping small business owners and his innovative way of thinking, has allowed him to run multiple successful businesses including National Business Capital & Services. Under the National name, the team was able to help secure over $1 Billion in financing for small businesses nationwide.