Ever asked the question of how to get new customers? It is something businesses pursue everyday. However are business owners missing out on opportunity? In this blog you will learn how being transparent and focusing on your existing customers can get you higher sales than you thought possible.

We have all heard the expression “repeat business is cheap business”, this probably isn’t news to anyone here. I still have a few stats which help reinforce this:

Repeat business accounts for 40% of a stores revenue. 

And once customers have come back once, that the chance of them coming back only increases:

“After one purchase, a customer has a 27% chance of returning to your store. While that’s not a horrible return rate if you can get that customer to come back and make a second and third purchase they have a 54% chance of making another purchase.” Studies also show that a repeat customer has a 60-70% chance of converting (it’s worth noting that this is for shoppers, this will obviously vary industry to industry).

And my final stat of this section:

It can cost 5x more to acquire new customers than to keep current ones – The National Law Review 

So what is the secret to having loyal customers who come back to your business time after time? There isn’t one! There are a whole host of things you can do and today we are looking at one: Transparency. 

The reality is, your customers can handle the truth, and the truth they shall get. In order to build long-term relationships, you will have to start trusting in the fact that they can handle the truth you give them. That is where transparency comes in. Businesses built with a culture of transparency from the top down give themselves a fantastic advantage.

Transparency from your teams all the way through to your customers.

Why?

Because again… The stats say so!

94% of customers will remain loyal to entirely transparent companies. 

73% even said that they would pay more for products with the company was always truthful with customers. 

Don’t close the feedback loop.

Let’s look at the reality here, we all make mistakes, little ones, big ones- we’re all human. Naturally, we try to minimise these mistakes, but they will slip through the net from time to time.

Never forget that your customers are humans as well and whilst they are paying for your service, they aren’t (always) going to crucify your team when owning up to mistakes.

Learn from these mistakes, take feedback, let people know how you are handling it and take the appropriate course of action.

When taking feedback, be careful to note who is giving it. Is it your key demographic or is it a group of people entirely outside this bracket? This will help you access if there is and what the course of action should be.

Is your business transparent from the top to the bottom?