Generate Happy Clients Even When Your Industry Is Challenging

There are many ways to impress your customers. However, there are some industries where this is more difficult than others. Airlines, internet providers, financial services, and insurance are some examples that come to mind. These are areas that are stereotyped for ever-increasing prices, lousy customer service, and products or services that don’t live up to expectations.

If you work or operate a company in a disliked sector of the market, it’s important that you take customer loyalty seriously. The predetermined stereotypes and stigmas that surround your niche will always work against you. But, that doesn’t have to be the end of the story.

Here are a few ways in which a company in an unpreferred industry can become a beacon of light for consumers — even if they distrust your industry as a whole.

1. Offer Real Resources:

The internet-driven world revolves around one major marketing medium these days: content. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about social media posts, website copy, free downloadables, or any other sort of material. If you don’t have content online, it’s difficult for your target audience to see you.

When approached in a shallow manner, though, this can often lead to a critical misstep for those in unpopular industries. If you only create meaningless social media content or fill your website with short, irrelevant blog posts, it won’t do much good. Twenty-first-century customers are more informed than ever before, and they know what they’re looking for.

If you want to find an effective way to rise above the clutter, you must invest in quality content. This often revolves around valuable resources that help both existing and potential customers.

For instance, if you’re an internet service provider, it’s tempting to create shallow sales pitches for your website. Too many ISPs push pre-designed bundles on their customers, funneling them toward a predetermined point of purchase.

If you want to stand out against other ISPs, offer resources that can genuinely help customers whittle down their needs and choose the best plan that fits them. Provide information on different Wi-Fi connectivity issues and how to fix them. Share resources about what kind of internet speed plan customers actually need or an internet speed-test testing link. These kinds of resources demonstrate to a website visitor that you have their best interests in mind. You don’t want them to overpay or to purchase anything but the best product to fit their needs.

2. Perfect Your Customer Service:

Customer service is a classic area of criticism for many hated industries. Representatives are too often uninterested, unrelatable, or out of touch. Convoluted IVR (interactive voice response) systems leave customers frustrated and confused. Emails go unanswered far past the promised response date.

If you want to impress customers in a hated industry, you don’t need to butter them up with sales pitches or overpromise to get their attention. All you need to do is give them a good customer experience.

Now, it’s important to point out that this doesn’t mean you have to generate customers that are over the moon for your services. Remember, you’re working with individuals who have an unpleasant disposition toward you right from the get-go. A divorce lawyer who sets out to make overjoyed customers is going to be disappointed before long. The same goes for a collection agency representative.

It’s much better to focus on addressing customer needs. In other words, stop focusing on delighting customers. Instead, make your aim to serve them well and address their issues. You can do this in a few different ways, such as:

Creating universal employee documentation:

This should be accessible from anywhere and easy to update. This can ensure that all of your customer service representatives have the correct information and updated solutions that they are giving to customers.

Ensuring that your brand voice is consistent:

Your niche may be unpopular, but you can still develop a brand that is known for its positive vibes. If you want to do this, it’s once again important to keep your employees on the same page. Take the time to outline things like your brand’s voice, tone, and persona so that it remains consistent.

Conduct ongoing training:

Perpetual training can help keep your customer service team at the top of their game. It maintains unity and ensures that everyone is following industry best practices. This can help them act as part of the collective face of your company.

If you can invest in a quality customer service team, it can take any disgruntled customer and turn them into a loyal advocates for your brand.

3. Focus on Delivering on Your Promises:

Another option, and one that aligns well with stellar customer service, is to focus on your company’s values and vision. For instance, an airline is focused on getting its customers from point A to point B. Of course, sooner or later every airline will face complications in this activity.

Weather delays, mechanical issues, and even customer errors can leave flyers stranded — and very upset. When that happens, the blame works its way back to the airline in most cases. If you’re an airline that is facing unhappy customers on a regular basis, one solution is to set up a value proposition that caters to your customers’ needs.

For example, while Southwest Airlines functions like a regular airline company, it also goes above and beyond to satisfy its customers. The company has defined its business purpose as one that focuses on company culture and providing a quality service to its customers. Though simple, this high-minded goal is one that the company is always striving to maintain — to the pleasure of its clientele.

There are many ways to align your brand with your customers, even in an unpopular industry. You can offer quality resources that help them through an unpleasant process. You can equip your customer service team with the knowledge and resources to turn bad experiences into good ones. You can even align your company with customer-centric values. If you can do that, your company will begin to stand out against the competition, without any need for frills or splashy sales gimmicks along the way.

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