Part of my daily line-up at Rentec Direct is sorting through any subscription cancellations to glean why a customer has decided to jump ship. We keep a close eye on why/where people come to us, but an even closer look at why they leave. Understanding where you went wrong is equally, if not more important, than what was so attractive about you, at least that's what a bazillion statistics tell us.
The Harvard Business Review reports that the average business loses 50% of their customers every five years.
Without any serious computations, I know this means a ton of lost revenue, wasted advertising budget and people power, or as Emmet Murphy & Mark Murphy wrote in their book, Leading on the Edge of Chaos,
“Acquiring new customers can cost as much as five times more than satisfying and retaining current customers.”
So, when I read this response today from one customer who canceled, I knew we had failed on some level and I had some investigation work to do...
A few thoughts went through my head as I began to call this previous customer, like, how am I going to gracefully say "can I talk to the person who wears the pants in your family?" Or, what if she's mean on the phone? Calling someone who has rejected you is like cold calling times ten. You have to brace yourself to hear just why you suck. So, I put a smile on my face, cleared my throat, found my most compassionate voice and began my inquisition.
Come to find out, the "wife" just hadn't had time to learn how to use our program completely and she was concerned about paying for subscription costs if she wasn't going to use the program. Whew! Now that's an easy fix!
"85 % of consumers who would have quit a business say they would have remained customers if the business had acted differently to prevent them from switching."
– Accenture Consumer Pulse Research
I offered her my personal assistance to be sure she had all the tools she needed to learn the program and then offered her 30 days for free just to be sure she didn't spend a dime until she was trained in. Bingo! That was all it took for her to say she's stay on. I know this will take some follow-up to be sure she truly does stay on, but all in all, that was a pretty quick and painless process to save a customer.
Do you contact customers who have fallen off your roster?
Janell is a member of Rentec Direct, a web-based property management software program designed to help streamline tenant screening and the day-to-day operations of landlords and property managers.
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