We imagine you’re knee-deep in brainstorming a 2021 marketing plan that incorporates the oddities of 2020’s consumer behaviors as part of your strategic forecast for this year. Below are three digital marketing tips that can help unify your social media strategies under one primary goal: build customer retention. Now more than ever is the time to meet your clients in their digital spheres or risk irrelevance.
- Uncover Loyalty Patterns in your Customer Base.
- Promote up-to-date product information.
- Work with micro-influencers to build brand trust.
Before discussing how to strategize social media to achieve customer retention, let’s define the term. Customer retention is your ability to convert first-time buyers into repeat-purchasing pals.
Uncover Loyalty Patterns in your Customer Base
To design a social media plan focused on building loyalty, first figure out your customer retention rate. Your retention rate is impacted by customers lost and gained over a designated period. Follow the formula below to calculate your customer retention rate and spot any historic upswings or downswings in their behaviors.
((Number of Customers at the end of Period minus the number of Customers Acquired During Period, divided by the number of customers at Start of Period)) multiplied by 100.
For example, you start with 15 customers, gain ten customers, and lose eight customers.
15 + 10 – 8 = 17 Customers at End of Period
10 = Customers acquired During Period
15 = Customers at Start of Period
((17 – 10) divided by 15)) x 100 = 47% Retention Rate.
With that number in mind, you now have a metric that can fuel an audit to determine customer loss trends.
Using your customer retention rate, you can:
- Further improve your sales process
- Add qualifying questions to your client contract to help prevent losing customers
- Better define your ideal buyer persona
- Employ social media strategies that cater to your loyal base
- Predict historic customer patterns
Takeaway: Use your customer retention rate as the basis for an audit of your customer’s loyalty and loss patterns.
Promote up-to-date product information
Now for some statistics. 54% of social users researched products on social media before purchasing. Furthermore, according to the 2020 digital marketing analysis by Sprout Social, 60% of people followed brands to learn about new products and services.
Social media is imperative for brand visibility. After surveying 1028 consumers and 1003 marketers, the data revealed that 89% of consumers purchase from a brand they follow on social media, and 75% will increase spending with that same brand.
Takeaway: People mostly engage with your brand’s social media to stay informed. Bolster brand loyalty by providing your customers with relevant, up-to-date product information.
Work with micro-influencers to build brand trust.
COVID-induced restrictions have resulted in an oversaturation of ads. To help reach new buyers through social media, influencers can provide a strategic voice to vouch for your products’ and brand’s quality. When successful, influencers can harness their position as a thought leader to generate brand loyalty among their followers. Collaborating with an influencer can be incredibly advantageous.
However, does an influencer’s size matter? Will a more significant following generate more views for your product?
According to a recent report, the answer is no.
After analyzing 800,000 users (with the majority having at least 1k users), researchers found that an influencer’s follower total is inversely correlated to their engagement (likes and comments). This means influencers with less than 1k followers received 8% engagement while influencers with 10 million+ followers only received 1.6% engagement.
In other words, dodge expensive macro-influencers and instead collaborate with micro-influencers. Smaller influencers boast a cult-like following and yield a higher ROI through meaningful engagement with a niche demographic that is actively tuned into what they share. The research concluded the ideal following is between 10k – 100k for effective brand promotion collaborations with influencers.
Takeaway: Strategically collaborate with micro-influencers to tap into their niche following and achieve a higher ROI for your partnership.
We hope you find our 3 points for retaining customer attention through social media helpful for your business. For more tips and insight into digital marketing, web design, and more, contact us here.
