6 tips to improve user retention rate!

Generally speaking, the cost of attracting a new user is five or even ten times the cost of maintaining an old user.

At the same time, the consumption capacity and support for the platform of an old user are much higher than those of a new user.

So, today let’s talk about what aspects we should focus on to maintain our old users.

Of course, today we are more inclined to the theoretical level. We will have the opportunity to talk to you separately about some specific cases of our products later.

01 Provide consistent high-quality products

Whether you are writing articles, providing services, or selling goods, from the user's perspective, it is a commodity.

It may be provided by you for free, such as the village chief writing an article, or it may be purchased by users.

If the quality of the articles you write or the videos you shoot does not improve or even declines, users will unfollow you.

Of course, there is another situation. It’s not because your content or product is bad, but because the user’s awareness and consumption ability have improved, and you are no longer suitable for him.

To give a very simple example, when I had a monthly salary of 3,500 yuan, Shaxian Lanzhou Ramen was the restaurant I visited most frequently, and I also stayed in the Home Inn chain.

But as my monthly income exceeded ten thousand yuan, I started to increase the frequency of my visits to shopping malls and upgraded my accommodation to hotels such as Four Seasons.

At this time, you have to consider whether you should focus on existing users or provide other upgraded services. This is how you plan the user's consumption path , and it is also a means of retention.

For example, Xiaomi’s previous positioning as a cost-effective phone was mainly a thousand-yuan phone. But now there are the Redmi economical model, the Black Shark gaming model, and the MIX FLOD high-end model.

But whether it is vertically targeting a certain group or having a product matrix that satisfies different users, the most essential thing is that the product quality must continue to satisfy users.

Many e-commerce companies lose old customers mostly because the products they subsequently purchase are not satisfactory.

02 Focus on users’ after-sales service experience

Just focusing on selling, not caring about after-sales service, this is a mistake that many platforms easily make, and often the service cannot keep up with sales.

One is to ignore such problems during rapid business development, and the other is to underestimate such problems when the business enters a stable period.

As for users, if they spend money but do not get good after-sales guarantee, they will naturally be disappointed with the platform.

The platform must not treat the term "no worries after-sales service" as a slogan, or at least as a promise.

From the customer's perspective, good after-sales service should meet the following four or three aspects:

Prompt response, thoughtful service, worry-free after-sales, and beyond expectations.

But there are many brands that ensure after-sales service as the beginning of ripping off customers, such as car repairs.

In addition, when providing services to old customers, it is necessary to make it clear what services they enjoy.

Until now, many people still believe that the services of e-commerce are merely returns and exchanges for users. This awareness is actually still relatively rudimentary and cannot increase user repurchase.

03 Don’t let users find you

Every time after selling goods, merchants are afraid that users will come to them, and even actively refuse to contact users.

Have you ever encountered the situation that you can never get through to some institutions by calling them?

Those who are afraid of users finding them, or who believe that users find poor service, are not confident in their products and services, are afraid of trouble and loss, and assume that users are bad people.

Some time ago, I read a business case in which the boss of a maternal and child platform gave his customer service department full rights to compensate.

If a customer buys a product for 100 yuan and it really has problems, the customer does not need to return it, and the customer service will have to compensate him another 100 yuan.

The customer service manager at the time felt that this did not comply with general e-commerce return and exchange rules. He was also afraid of being taken advantage of by customers and worried about having to pay a large amount of money in compensation every day.

But the fact is just the opposite. Because of this compensation policy, the investment promotion department selects products more strictly and ensures the quality of goods.

Because of the platform's claims service that exceeded their expectations, users continued to consume and invited more friends.

In fact, let’s think carefully about why users actively seek us out:

1. Not every time a user comes to you it is for after-sales issues; it may be for other inquiries.

2. If a user is willing to actively seek consultation from you, it means that he potentially trusts you and recognizes you, and you have one more chance for conversion.

Another question is how to enable users to find us quickly?

In fact, different products come in many forms. For example, some hardware products will have automatic customer service information, as well as official, public accounts, telephone, offline repair centers, etc.

But at present, the most important channel to build is to give customers your WeChat contact information and let them become your WeChat friends.

This way, not only can he find you, but you can also continue to influence him through your circle of friends.

The more often you appear, the deeper the impression he will have of you, the more at ease he will feel, and the greater the chance that he will choose you next time!

04 Never let your users forget you

Never assume that users will actively remember you. Even if you are a product that they use frequently, users may forget you.

Therefore, we need to build channels to contact users and maintain a mechanism to communicate and remind users.

First of all, from the perspective of channels, we can contact users through APP push, SMS, pop-up windows, group messages, one-on-one private chats, official accounts, Moments, outdoor advertising, telephone follow-up, etc.

Secondly, in terms of the frequency of reminders, appropriate reminders should be provided, which will benefit users rather than disturb them.

Different products and services require different frequencies of communication with users.

For example, if you sell houses or cars, although users use them every day, you don’t need to call them every day.

If you are running an e-commerce platform or a social network, you should remind your users at least once a day.

If you sell electric bikes, you can contact your users once a year. If you run an offline barber shop, you can contact your users once a month.

Finally, in terms of the motivation for contact, it can be to provide benefits to users, to remind users to change, or to invite users to participate in a trial opportunity, etc.

In short, your reasons should be attractive enough to users.

05 Be a warm person

The village chief has never celebrated his birthday since he was a child. It seems that in our entire family, only people over 60 years old celebrate birthdays.

Now, every year on my birthday, I will receive blessing text messages from Alipay and China Merchants Bank because I have filled in my personal information there.

Normally, I ignore most of the messages these apps send me, but this is the only one I’ll open and take a look at every year. It’s a very subtle relationship.

Although we essentially only have a consumer relationship with our customers, how we consolidate the consumer relationship is closely related to what we do.

The birthday care I just mentioned is one form of care, which is through text message reminders, but what if it is an offline business?

For example, in a bar, can users sing karaoke for free once? Can the cake shop give users something extra? Can the hotel send a cake or an extra meal to VIP members?

I remember one time when I was on a business trip by plane, it happened to be my birthday. It was the first time that I enjoyed the entire cabin celebrating my birthday. This made me give priority to their airline when flying in the future, and I will also share this experience with my friends.

I have previously shared Pang Donglai’s business cases, which cited many of Pang Donglai’s touching services.

For example, we provide free medicine to customers, free rain gear, free phone calls, free hair dryers on rainy days, etc.

As we just mentioned, after adding the user to your WeChat, will you like or send a small red envelope of 6.66 when the customer posts on his or her Moments on his or her birthday?

Whether it is an individual, a branded product or a service organization, you can actually be a "person" with warmth, and users can sense it.

06 Make users look forward to you

Why do users look forward to Apple’s mobile phone launch conference every year?

Because everyone thinks it is the direction indicator of the industry, from its appearance design to product functions to peripheral products, there are indeed some amazing aspects.

Therefore, innovation is the core for any individual and brand to remain competitive.

If you are selling clothes, and a user goes to your store two months later and sees the same clothes as before, the probability of the user placing an order is very low.

You have to know that users tend to get tired of the old and love the new.

Have you released any new products this year, upgraded your services, or updated your gameplay?

In fact, brand product upgrades not only meet user consumption needs, but also meet user reputation needs.

It is very common that if you have something new every year, users will be proud to be your consumers.

The same is true for the village chief's articles. If Shili Village writes about community operations every day, fewer and fewer people will read it, because there is not much content worth expressing in it.

There are also those who provide paid knowledge. If they do not promote Douyin live streaming, Taobao sales, and video account monetization, gradually no users will want to buy.

Therefore, if we want to retain customers, we have to start from multiple dimensions. We need to make users happy, make them feel that they are growing, and make them feel warm.

Author: Shili Village

Source: Shili Village (shilipxl)