So how are you nurturing your clients this holiday season?
If you are like most lawn care or landscaping companies you probably aren’t and that’s bad news. Ill tell you why.
During this slow season we have to nurture our client relationships and keep reminding them that WE are going to be their lawn care provider come next season… and that we appreciate them for their business, after all they are the source of our success.
So how do we do that?
Personalized Christmas cards!
Really Christmas cards?
Why should you do that?
We want to PROTECT our current lawn care customers from competitors & DECREASE annual client churn going into the next season.
“It costs 6–7 times more to acquire a new customer than retain an existing one.”
So its critical during the winter months that we don’t let our lawn care customers forget about us. And that means communicating with them regularly even when we aren’t actively serving them.
Studies have shown that the value of a customer weakens by at least 10% for each month that passes without communication. The same is true during the season even if you are delivering great work, your relationship can sour.
You must nurture the client relationship.
As many as 68% of clients that leave and go to a different company, go to a competitor – not because they’re truly unhappy with your service, but because they feel unimportant, they feel neglected, they feel that their business with your organization isn’t that important.
We can combat this by communicating regularly and showing our gratitude for their business.
The longer we are out of our clients minds the quicker we are forgotten. So In the off season it is crucial that we stay top of mind.
If they know your coming back and you’ve primed them to expect you, they wont look for someone else. And they wont be surprised to see you when spring comes around
We also want our relationship with our clients to get stronger, the closer we get to our clients the longer they stay client.
We do that by communicating. We do that by becoming friends with them. And teaching our staff to do the same.
That also means reminding them we appreciate their business and we expect to be serving them again next year.
Think about it like this… if your married have a girlfriend or boyfriend… imagine if you came home every night and never acknowledge them or speak to them… is your relationship going to getting better or worse… I’m willing to wager you will be splitting up pretty soon.
We need to look at our client relationships the same way…
So I recommend…
At the bare minimum, you should send Christmas cards to your top clients. Your best most profitable clients. Hand write them a personal message, thank them for trusting you this season.
I also recommend you send cards to all your customers, they don’t all have to be handwritten.
You can find an online print shop that will let you submit your client list and they will handle everything.
If you have less than a 100 clients, you can easily hand write them all and do it yourself.
If you are a smaller company a family business or like to let your personality show (I recommend you do) I would send them a photo card of you and your family, thanking them for their business. This will reinforce the fact that they are doing business with real people, not your company logo.
But I also wouldn’t just stop at Current customers I would also pull out your old client list of past customers that still reside in your market and need to be reactivated. Now is the time to start warming them up for next season.
Take their lifetime value into account as well. If it is the decision maker at a commercial property you maintain that’s is generating multiple thousands of dollars or more each month I wouldn’t be sending them just a Christmas card. I would send them a gift with a personal note attached.
So this is your homework this week. Show your customers you really appreciate their business and build a stronger relationship…
Get on it!
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