By Margie Zable Fisher
As a health and wellness professional, it’s easier for you to provide a better experience for ongoing clients as you learn more about them and what works to help solve their challenges.
That’s good, because it takes more work to gain a new client. According to several studies, it may be from five to 25 times more expensive than keeping an existing one.
In addition to a listening ear and providing solutions, clients also want to know that you value them. As with all good relationships, you need to put in some work to remind them of their value.
You’d probably rather be helping your clients with their issues instead of spending time and money on other ways to keep them happy. Luckily, Thryv offers many time- and money-saving ways to deepen relationships with your existing clients. Here are six ideas:
1. Check in with Clients You Haven’t Seen in a While
According to an Accenture survey, 70% of healthcare patients deferred or canceled treatment during COVID-19. While a portion of those have come back for treatment, some have not. Gyms and other health and wellness businesses also experienced a loss of some of their “regulars.”
Now is a good time to remind them that you’d love to see them again. It’s easy to do. Choose those customers you haven’t seen since the pandemic, and send them a “We Miss You” message through Thryv’s Announcements feature.
In addition to letting them know you can’t wait to see them, use this opportunity to update them on new services (such as telehealth or virtual visits and online scheduling) and safety precautions that your office is taking. You can also ask them to confirm or update their contact information.
2. Send Regular, Useful Email Updates
Make sure your emails get opened by providing something of value with each of your email communications. If you have a monthly newsletter, one easy way to do that is to repurpose informative content provided by your Thryv social media team.
For example, you could put together some of the social media tips in features such as, “Top Health and Wellness Tips for November,” or “Five New Ways to Build Muscle” or “Healthy Thanksgiving Dinner Options.”
Bonus tip: Include three online “Reviews of the Month” in each newsletter. This provides you with three wins. First, you are reiterating your outstanding customer service to your existing clients. Second, you are reminding clients that you like and value reviews, which may encourage them to post a positive review. Third, they will be more likely to open your newsletter emails, to see if they are featured in the “Reviews of the Month” section.
3. Celebrate with Your Customers
During the pandemic, we’ve let others into our personal lives more than we ever have before. This is an opportunity to build relationships by celebrating important dates with your customers.
An easy way to do this is to create an automated email or text campaign around milestone events, such as birthdays. Just create a custom field in your client cards for birthdays, and use a template and message that Thryv has created (or create your own).
Another option is to celebrate the anniversary of your customer’s first service with you. Again, you can create an automated email or text campaign tied to the first service field on the client card, and use a Thryv template or create a custom message.
4. Send a Card to Their Homes
The pandemic has reminded us of the joy of getting something in our mailbox. Instead of a bill, your patients and clients will be delighted to receive a thoughtful note. Consider sending a printed thank you (at Thanksgiving or after a referral), a holiday card or step up your birthday card program to sending actual cards instead of emails and texts.
Save time by using Thryv’s connection to Zapier, which can pull contact information from your client cards that can be used to create “hand-written” cards from services like Cardly.
5. Provide World-class Customer Service
This is an inexpensive and powerful marketing tool, and is also underutilized. After COVID-19, with too few workers providing little or no customer service, your customer service efforts will help you stand out even more.
Make sure to train your team (and yourself) on offering excellent customer service. At the minimum, everyone should interact with clients by providing a pleasant phone call experience, using a customer’s name, keeping appointment times and thanking customers after a service.
6. Resolve Complaints
Clients may be hesitant to give you negative feedback in person, but they might do so in an online review. That’s why it’s important to monitor online reviews (you can do this through Thryv) and respond to all of them (including the positive ones), quickly.
If you receive a negative review, research the situation with your team, and then call your client. A personal call showing that you care enough about the situation is an important step towards resolving the issue, as well as getting valuable feedback about concerns that may be bothering other patients and clients.
Sometimes clients will post an update saying that you resolved the issue. Even if they don’t, in the long run, you may have an even more loyal customer, and you may have improved a situation or process in your business.
These six ideas will help you strengthen relationships with your clients, while minimizing the time and money you need to spend. This will free you and your team up to provide the help and care that makes your business unique.
