Did anyone ever tell you about Touch Points in marketing? You see, touch points can improve your marketing and your customer retention.
But what is a touch point?
Now, a touch point is quite simply: any time you have any kind of contact with your customers or potential customers.
This short video explains:
Funnily enough, all marketing and reach to potential customers is about touch points.
Whether that’s through email, advertising, social media, going to networking events, attending seminars, putting on events, going to trade shows etc.
However, it is that you reach a potential customer or a customer is a touch point.
But there’s a little bit more to it than that, and there’s a lot more nuances which you can really begin to take advantage of.
And it’s always worthwhile trying to get more touch points in marketing activities.
How touch points work
If you’ve been in business a while you’ll know that all customers go through a lead generation, nurture sale conversion process. And every single time you push people down your sales funnel, every time you have a contact with one of these potential customers, it’s called a touch point.
It could even mean a face to face visit. But it’s a touch point.
Now, Interestingly enough, you may have heard that customers can often need as many as ten touch points before they get to making a proper buying decision.
Which means that you need to get really good at touch points.
And what I recommend is that you mix it up, email, phone call, social media, even just stopping by, et cetera.
Here’s why touch points in marketing work so well:
The more you’re in their space, the more you will resonate with them in their mind.
And the more you resonate with them in their mind, the more favourable they’re likely to look upon you and the more likely it is that they’re going to buy from you.
But here’s what a lot of businesses don’t seem to understand: it needs to go on beyond just making the sale.
Never stop with touch points, even after the sale
Probably 80% plus of small businesses really start to go wrong because they neglect the customer when they’ve made the sale.
And that’s completely and totally wrong because you need those touch points.
People like to feel like they’ve been included during the sales process, but also being included during the relationship with you as a customer.
Now, touch points can be simply as sending out an email to your list once a week. It’s a touch point.
It can also be tagging somebody or having conversation with somebody or engaging with somebody’s posts on a social media.
It could also mean monthly meetings or follow up phone calls, et cetera.
It could (and really should) have an onboarding system.
Are you doing as much as you possibly can to make new customers feel welcome? And if not, why not?
And onboarding even goes so far as signage. When a customer comes to your premises, can they easily find where to go? Are there welcome messages?
When they get to your car park, for example, they need to know where reception is. I don’t know how many times I’ve wandered around a building trying to locate the entrance.
Are your receptionists personable and/or chatty? Do they smile?
Nobody wants to see cold, stony, so-called “professional” faces. They want to see someone who’s actually smiling and genuinely looks happy to see them.
It may seem crazy, but this is all part of the customer journey, the customer relationship, the touch points.
You might not think that your receptionist, and whether she smiles or not, is a big deal. But I promise you it is. Because when somebody visits your premises, they want to feel warm and welcomed. It’s a touch point.
Not just a conversation
It’s also about how you talk to people and how often you talk to them.
Touch points are a big deal, because ultimately being in business, especially when you sell B to B business to business, it’s all about the relationship.
It’s all about communication.
It’s all about making people feel welcome, making people feel included, making people feel wanted.
Literally I could do a whole seminar and touch points alone because there are so many different ways of doing it well and so many good examples even now of people doing it badly.
At the very least you should have a client’s onboarding system.
When somebody signs up to the Auckland Marketing Club, there is an onboarding process which has been set up to make people feel included. Partially automated, part manual.
And it’s there because I want members to feel that when they become a client that they are welcomed, that we’re grateful that they become a client, we’re grateful that they joined the club.
So work on this. Touch points in marketing is a big deal. It will improve your customer retention as well.
It isn’t complex, but it does take a bit of thought.
Running a small business or self-employed in Auckland? Check out the Auckland Marketing Club and get help to make sure your marketing works. Find out more here: https://smashingselfemployment.com/how-the-auckland-marketing-club-works/
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