A solid customer onboarding process introduces a new customer to your products or services. It is a time where you will begin to build a relationship and understand your customer’s expectations of your company. Your goal is to please your customer so you can create opportunities for copywriting, new sales, upsells and renewals. If you aren’t successful at onboarding, your customer will be left with a bad impression of your company; which will lead to lost sales, missed opportunities and possibly tarnish your reputation.
Customer onboarding is vital to your company. Customer onboarding best practices will help you grow and expand your business. Here are some best practices that will help you ace the onboarding process.
Set expectations and milestones
We all know that any process is easier if we know the steps that are needed to complete the task. The same can be said when you’re onboarding a customer. If they know the process and where they are at in that process, you’ve made it easier and more manageable for your customer. You can give them the road map to complete all of the steps. Consider setting up a graphic on your website that shows your customer where they are in the process.
Now that you’ve set expectations, the next step is to establish goals or milestones. Be realistic with your customer. Break things down into manageable pieces. You don’t want to over-promise on expectations or timing because that will leave your customer unhappy.
Customize the experience
The experience you create for each customer should be valuable, useful, desirable and accessible. This is especially important for large purchases and B2B sales. Some things that you may want to consider are client-only portals and service representatives, exclusive content, copywriting and personal profiles. You should know enough about your customer and the process, so you answer your customer’s questions before they even ask them. This will delight your customer.
Onboard your team
Everyone in your company should understand the onboarding process for your customer, not just your sales team. This will align your team with the process so the customer can flow through the process easier with less time needed for your sales staff to brief the next department, or worse–dropping the customer between different staff members. If everyone is on board and knows their part, the process will be seamless for the customer.
Build a relationship with your customer
Get to know them and what they like and need. Follow them on social media. Call them to check in on how things are going. Relationships build trust and trust leads to additional sales. You can even build trust when making a retail sale. If the salesperson asks questions and is honest with the customer, they will consider coming back to your store for future purchases.
Gather data and communicate
You cannot help your customer find solutions if you do not know what they need. There are many ways to collect data in the world today. You may consider Google Analytics, sales cycle length or buying tendencies. Whatever is important for your industry, collect the necessary data so you can stay informed on the market and your customer.
Talk to your clients about all the great information you’ve gathered. You have insights that will help them in their business or personal life. Consistent, good information will help build the relationship and make the onboarding process go smoothly. This should almost go without saying, but don’t leave them after the sale. Let them know that you’re there to answer all of their questions.
Your customer is now on board and we all know the relationship shouldn’t end there. Keep the door open to future sales by answering questions, copywriting, following up and providing important information to your customers. If you do these things, your customers will keep coming back for additional products and services. They’re also more likely to recommend your company if they had a great experience and the relationship is solid.
We’re here to help you establish a customer onboarding process! If you’d like help building your onboarding process, contact Outlook Business Solutions. We are here to help you grow your customer base and retain those valuable customers.