It’s a well known fact that unhappy customers tend to tell their colleagues about their bad experiences. But research by US firm TARP shows that for every 26 unhappy customers, only one will lodge a formal complaint with Management. This then results in up to 1,560 people hearing about at least one of these bad experiences.

The biggest barrier to a customer registering their feedback is a combination of valuing their own time and the idea that the feedback won’t be actioned in any meaningful way.

So why not kill two birds with one stone? Offer the convenience of an online feedback form that not only chronicles customer feedback but also gives you an opportunity to win customers back.

A great example of a feedback form that gets a lot of traffic for one of our clients can be found at www.nationaltiles.com.au/feedback.htm. While the feedback may not be positive 100% of the time, the customer is still giving the company an opportunity to do something about their complaint rather than heading over to one of the competitors.

Remember too that asking for feedback alone is not enough - you must make the commitment to establish an effective customer feedback response process that addresses each issue that arises. In doing so, you not only encourage people to continue giving you feedback (because they know that you’ll do something about it), but research also shows that between 54-70 percent of business from complaining customers can be won back if the process is handled promptly and professionally.

Finally, any kind of feedback is really free market research for you to build future marketing strategies on. So why not run a competition that requires entrants to respond to 10 quick questions via your feedback form? It’s quick and easy for them (no postage required) and it’s critical information for you.

Many of you may have received emails from companies that appear as mini-websites, what we call HTML newsletters, or e-newsletters.

E-newsletters are by far the cheapest, easiest method to promote repeat business with your existing customer base or even future customers. Whether it be specials, promotions, new products and services or existing products and services, e-newsletters are a great way of keeping your business fresh in the minds of customers. Consider this:

My brother occasionally calls on me to help him with the purchasing of PC Computers for his business. The last time I helped him with this, about a year ago, I used a Victorian company whose website was very easy to use and had the customer service to back it up. Every month since then, I have received an e-newsletter from them outlining their latest specials that I might have browsed through quickly and then deleted. Then last month, my brother calls again with a need for more PC’s. Who do you think was the first port of call? In the cut-throat, low-margin area of computer sales, this is a pretty handy-advantage for this PC company to have.

What was the cost to that PC company? Virtually zero. Were they the best deal on offer? Maybe. But the relationship I have with this company that could have very easily been the length of the first transaction (i.e. a couple of days) now stretches over a number of years. So my opinion of them is likely to remain pretty high.

E-newsletters can be a weekly, monthly, bi-monthly or even annual proposition to your business and consistently return customers to your website or your front door again and again.