Before you read this article, make a list of all the businesses you are fiercely loyal to. Who would you enthusiastically endorse, adamantly defend and whose competitors have no chance in hell at capturing your eye – or your business? I am discussing business, not brands necessarily although many of us have powerful, obnoxious loyalty to certain brands (e.g. mine are Apple, BMW, Blue Bell Ice Cream).
It should be a long list, right? I made my own list and the exercise was much harder than I thought. There are so many great companies that I do business with both professionally and personally yet only a handful made it to my unflinching loyalty list.
The following companies have my complete customer loyalty. I would step in front of a speeding freight train in order to keep doing business with them. Here they are by name but not in any particular order or ranking:
Tall Oaks Cleaners
Whole Foods, nearly any store
Tom Phillips, financial advisor
Amazon.com
John King, Attorney-at-Law
Bluehost.com
Perron Chiropractic
I sat back to see what these businesses have in common to achieve my highest customer loyalty.
1. Years of doing business together through many transactions that succeed. They have survived the test of time and the test of doing a lot of business with me. Each of these businesses has had opportunity after opportunity to keep me or lose me. All have had many chances to prove they are the quality I expect. They have proven it enough times to convince me they are authentic in the quality of their services or products. Now, if we should ever have a hiccup, I would be ever so forgiving and would not run to their competition.
2. Each business begins with quality and customer service. Their businesses run on the fuel of responsive and complete customer service. It’s in their very core and I can feel it and taste it (well, that’s a bit too much drama).
3. They have taken the time to get to know me. All of them. They know what I want and like and don’t like and they provide their services or products to fit ME perfectly.
4. They have resolved problems magnificently. This may be the most important attribute of all. When a problem arises, and it always does, the high caliber of their response made me even more loyal.
When you think about who has your customer loyalty, you will uncover businesses who have met the four criteria above. It’s not brain surgery; it’s relationship building and keeping.
(next article will address how to determine levels of existing customer loyalty in your prospects)
