You’ve probably heard it a thousand times: marketing is all about recruiting new consumers to your company.

As marketers, we like discussing the strategies we use to accomplish our objectives. We publish papers, have Meetups, and host conferences to address issues such as branding, SEO, media purchasing, display advertising, branded content, and much more.

Continue reading to find out why you should prioritize client retention in order to build your company.

What exactly is retention?

Retention is the act of getting customers to “come back again and again.” Retention marketing is a collection of marketing strategies used to attract customers back to your business. Strategies are used to recruit clients and tactics are used to keep them engaged. Because retention starts after a purchase, marketers must rethink how they serve their consumers.

Samantha Anderl said in an article on the future of email marketing that the traditional marketing funnel no longer existed. Concentrating just on acquisition will no longer suffice. A marketing funnel is more than just acquisition.

A new marketing funnel has formed, combining pre-purchase and post-purchase phases to provide a comprehensive perspective of the client lifetime. Customer journeys that are multi-channel, multi-touch, and multi-path are the new marketing funnel.

The ultimate aim is no longer to turn a lead into a client. It is all about increasing the lifetime value of loyal clients who will return again and again.

The impact of retention on the marketing paradigm

Historically, marketing has been only concerned with attracting more consumers to a business.

Retention shifts the marketing paradigm: instead of looking for new prospective customers, you concentrate on producing more money from your current clients. This is not to mean you should abandon “conventional” marketing entirely. Instead, you should supplement your acquisition-focused marketing approaches with retention-focused ones.

Consider this retention strategy: email post-purchase automation. Such a campaign would be inexpensive. You must calculate the cost of email development, including text, design, scheduling, and the cost of the email marketing provider.

The price difference between an acquisition campaign and a retention effort might be significant. Furthermore, since you are targeting those who are already familiar with your brand, the ROI of the latter might be significantly larger than that of the former.

Loyalty and retention

While retention and loyalty share many similarities, there are several crucial distinctions to be aware of.

Retention evaluates the regularity with which an established client continues to conduct business with your company, while loyalty measures their proclivity to choose your company as their first choice.

In other words, when a consumer purchases from you for the second time, they are officially retained. However, this does not always imply that they are a devoted client. Rather than becoming their favorite retailer, your company may just provide better value or a wider assortment.

Your ultimate objective should be to increase retention while also making clients loyal to your business. Consider the previously shown funnel: expansion and advocacy appear only after retention. Simply said, you want to concentrate on retention in order to gain loyal clients.

Create a cult following via email marketing

Email marketing is an excellent technique for cultivating a cult following that will remain loyal to your company for the rest of its existence. It is one of the most important strategies you can use in your client retention marketing efforts. Here are a few examples of how you may utilize it to grow your cult following:

Make your customers feel welcome right away

The importance of first impressions cannot be overstated. They decide the eventual consequence of your consumer connection. Customer retention marketing begins before the sale, with your welcome email series.

Let’s look at some of the variables that might help you earn a loyal client with your welcome email series:

• Everything revolves around timing: Send your first welcome email as soon as your consumer joins up.
• Make it interesting: Incorporate your brand’s personality into your email. Don’t be scared to insert some levity.
• Provide a present: Including a “welcome gift” is a sure way to gain your customer’s love.

When your consumer feels welcomed, it is simpler for them to advance the connection.

Improve your onboarding procedure

Onboarding your clients is an important aspect of developing long-term connections with them. Onboarding is the process of converting a prospect into a committed client and beyond. A decent onboarding procedure includes the following steps:

• Building trust in your product: Use testimonials and case studies in your emails to do this.
• Encourage client feedback: Check in with your consumers on a frequent basis to see if they need assistance utilizing your product properly. This is why your feedback email is such a vital component of your onboarding process.
• Provide hints and hacks: You are the expert on your product. Offering your consumers tips and tricks to get the most out of your product is a terrific method to establish a customer retention marketing plan and a cult following.

Make the client journey memorable

When it comes to guiding your prospect to a sale, you must design a customer experience that will leave a lasting impact on them. A fantastic customer journey is the outcome of:

• Personalization: Everyone is loyal to a company that shows they care, and generating material that is specific to their interests indicates that they are more than simply a number on your list.
• Address their concerns: One of the most effective methods to drive your consumers to the answer – your product – is to assist them in understanding their difficulties. Being explicit about this provides a memorable customer journey.

A well-planned and executed customer journey is an excellent approach to use email to build a cult following.

Using these tactics, you can quickly nail your client retention efforts through email. That is why, as they say, email is king.

Conclusion

Marketing will continue to encounter developments that will test its traditions in the future. The way marketers advertise will continue to alter as it becomes simpler for them to employ technology such as AI, big data, and machine learning.

Along with technology advancements, marketers must broaden their horizons and concentrate on activities that go beyond consumer acquisition. Overlooking the sales funnel and focusing simply on a portion of it will no longer suffice.

Today and in the future, the new expanded funnel will encourage marketers to focus on the other areas of the funnel, where the ROI is found. Retention has evolved into the new marketing.