How to improve customer experience through corporate correspondence

Respect for our customers and striving to provide quality service is a key part of selling and trading in small and medium businesses. Still, in the last decade, more and more attempts were made to improve customer experience. This article is topical because we will soon switch over to a digital world without cookies. According to the experts, knowledge about your audience and customers, which is defined by the dialogue and contact you have with them, is getting more valuable by the day. A significant part of that takes place via email.

Gartner defines customer experience as the customer's perception and related feelings caused by the cumulative effect of interactions with the service provider's employees, systems, products and channels. Practically, your company is judged by the customer experience, based on which you receive your reviews on Google, Facebook, Trustpilot, Capterra, Product Search, Net Waiter, Vivino, etc. The public will form a perception about your brand, which is very difficult to build consciously and very easy to tear down.

According to experts, in order to provide an outstanding customer experience and to remain competitive, you must meet the following requirements:

1. Even more personalized experiences
2. Multiple access channels
3. Continuous presence and connection
4. Empathy and quick reaction to the problems that may arise
5. Instant solutions

The most efficient way to build a good relationship with customers is through email. 95% of the marketing profession says that email communication will remain an essential channel in the long run. Naturally, you can provide an ever-improving experience to your buyers and clients through phone calls, the social media, chat bots or various apps, and thereby build trust and commitment.

Email is a quick and easy way of reaching out to your customers and build the dialogue needed for providing services, help or advice. Regardless of the topic, you can personalize your message with text or any readily available item, helping to create a good customer experience. You can send personalized messages to the right audience at the right time in an easy, fast and efficient way. Who wouldn’t be happy to receive a personalized offer that provides a solution for a current issue, or discount coupons for his or her birthday? We have collected a few suggestions below.

1. Segmentation of your potential and existing customers and audience

Today, segmentation goes well beyond addressing someone by their first name. You can get far better results by using dynamic content blocks based on demographic or personal interest targeting, or information from previous purchases. It is a good idea to use as much automated solutions and templates as possible, each compiled individually per target group or combined from blocks. Pay attention to the subject field too! 47% of the buyers will decide based on the subject line whether to open your email or not.

2. The new client

They represent an extremely important segment who expect you to prove your worth through the in-depth presentation of your products and services and through educational content. These must be made available in a brief and on-the-point format that is suitable for reducing the number of complaints and establishing a close relationship.

3. Building the duration and quality of the relationship

Since there are so many ways to create value, it is a good idea to make a response roadmap in advance about when to actively contact the clients and when to just make yourselves available as the go-to person when needed. The strategy may be based on the following:

1. Welcome and introductory emails
2. Providing a new product or service, or replenishment of stocks in case of shortage
3. Milestones, birthday, opening a new store

Building on these will help you have a long and fruitful relationship with partners, clients and buyers.

4. Facilitating customer feedback

Do your best to make it easier for your customers to provide feedback. This is a relatively simple task that merely requires you to avoid putting too many calls to action, or CTAs, in one email. In personal emails, you can use a question, while in email campaigns, you can enter the response email address or even highlight the option to reply. You may also send a questionnaire to help you improve your offers or services based on customer feedback.

5. Stay human

This may sound funny at first, but with all the hardships experienced in connection with digitization, automation, home office and the pandemic situation, it is especially important to show our human values and that there are real people behind your products and content.

6. Give out rewards

Around the world loyalty schemes are successful, as argued, among others, by StoreInsider. Other options are to send promotional coupons, give priority access to new products or services, and advertise games that offer prizes an all the advantages of a shared experience with your customers.

7. Measure the efficiency, volume and response times of your emails.

We live in a world of urgency. Your users are becoming more and more impatient. Measuring and improving email response times will lead to the improvement of your reputation and effectiveness. This is especially true in these times affected by the pandemic. According to Jeff Toister’s analysis, more than 30% of customers expect a response within 1 hour, while the average response time for companies is about 12 hours.

As a result of the pandemic, the different aspects of customer experience have increasingly shifted into the digital space. The quality of customer experience can be maintained and increased by introducing new tools and methods. Since trust is harder to achieve in the digital space, you need to painstakingly monitor even the smallest details when designing or implementing your digital communications. Emailing has been an important part of digital communications for years. Its role will continue to grow in the coming years due to the global increase in the number of corporate emails. Along with these content strategies, you have more and better tools at your disposal to improve customer experience by analyzing and understanding email communications. Anvert is one such tool, since it is an email analysis software that offers:

1. Client segmentation and prioritization
2. Improved quality and lifespan of customer relationships
3. Reduction of the loss of customers through mood analysis
4. Preventing loss of business and prestige as a result of idel or unanswered emails
5. Shortened sales cycle and improved frequency of purchase through measuring and managing response times

An additional advantage ofAnvert is that you can do all this in a perfectly secure environment, where the protection of your customers and data is ensured, thus increasing the trust of your partners.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us if your company wishes to focus on improving customer experience, or if you have any questions. We offer a free consultation for answering your questions.

P.S.: The author has previously gained experience in improving customer experience as part of the European business development team of Google Ads, and then went on to work for a Hungarian brand that is active on 80+ export markets.