In today's challenging economy and competitive business world, retaining your customer base is critical to your success. If you don't give your customers some good reasons to stay, your competitors will give them a reason to leave. Customer retention and satisfaction drive profits. It's far less expensive to cultivate your existing customer base and sell more services to them than it is to seek new, single-transaction customers. Most surveys across industries show that keeping one existing customer is five to seven times more profitable than attracting one new one.
Here are some facts:
1. Acquiring new customers can cost five times more than satisfying and retaining current customers
2. A 2% increase in customer retention has the same effect on profits as cutting costs by 10%
3. The average company loses 10% of its customers each year
4. A 5% reduction in customer defection rate can increase profits by 25-125%, depending on the industry
5. The customer profitability rate tends to increase over the life of a retained customer
So why do you need to consider the impact of your telephone callers on hold experience as it relates to customer retention? Making your callers feel good about your company starts the moment your phone is answered if you want to forge strong relationships.Think of your phone system like a waiting room for your callers.
You have two options:
a) A waiting room that has nice décor, a comfortable place for them to sit and something to keep them entertained while they wait.
b) A waiting room with no décor, no place to sit and nothing to keep them occupied while they wait.
Silence on hold is like waiting room B. When waiting in that dreaded silence, callers are often left wondering. Have I been disconnected? Am I being transferred? Did I just get put into the phone system’s Black Hole? As a business, putting your callers On-hold to silence is one of the worst things you can do to hurt your Caller Experience. It’s like asking people to stand in your empty waiting room, and they’re just not going to stick around!
But give them something relevant and interesting to listen to while they’re On-Hold, and the wait time will seem very much diminished! In other words music on hold is like waiting room A for your callers. You can do a lot for your relationship building and customer retention when using professional music on hold & messages rather frustrating callers by waiting in dead silence. It can mean the difference between customers remaining loyal or seeking out a competitor.
On Hold messages not only entertain callers, but is also used to foster relationships and increase sales to with your existing customers. How many times over the course of your business existence has a customer said, “Gee, I didn’t know you also did that or you also carried this.” Don’t assume your customers know everything you offer as most of the time they are use to ordering only a specific product or service with your organization. By using on hold messages and reminding them of your complete portfolio of offerings you not only improve your chance at gaining additional sales, but you also prevent them from seeking out a competitor. During these economic times, people are more selective on where they spend their money. When they do decide to open their checkbooks, you want to be their first choice. Therefore, it's important your current customers choose to stay with you. You can ill afford to have customers leave as quickly as they came. Today, more than ever you need to reassure customers they have made the right choice to remain loyal, and you can accomplish this with an enhancement to your telephone systems hold feature by adding music on hold & messages.