7 Outstanding Ways to Use Salesforce to Boost Customer Retention

Salesforce is a customer-centric SaaS platform that is revolutionizing the way companies manage their customers. Salesforce has been useful for B2B companies to Boost Customer Retention which uses it to track and analyze relationships with individual clients as well as their organizations as a whole. Customer retention strategies have become increasingly important for all businesses, regardless of industry or size. There are several factors that can negatively impact customer loyalty and increase your turnover rate — including a lack of effective retention strategies. Fortunately, there are many ways to increase customer retention using Salesforce. Here’s how you can do it:

The power of centralization in one platform

I’ve written before about the benefits of integrating CRM and marketing tools to increase efficiency and lower costs. However, as far as to boost customer retention is concerned, it’s the centralization of contact management and the ability to bundle all communication channels — email, phone, social media, and marketing automation — that make a big difference. A single platform is an ideal environment to provide personalized experiences for customers, reducing the number of sales calls and increasing overall satisfaction with the brand. This also allows you to easily identify engagement patterns and create targeted marketing campaigns. When it comes to retention, optimizing your CRM for efficiency and centralization is one thing, but having the right cybersecurity and contact management policy is imperative. A CRM that has been hacked doesn’t help you increase customer retention; on the contrary, it puts you at risk of losing even more business.

Personalize customer experiences, big time

Generalized email blasts, impersonal chatbot responses, and impersonal emails are simply not cutting it anymore. They don’t offer a personalized experience, they don’t look professional and they’re not engaging. With Salesforce, however, you can personalize your emails and phone experiences with a suite of tools that allow you to segment recipients, set up advanced canned responses, adapt the tone and content of emails, and re-engage inactive customers with push notifications. If you’re selling products and services, you can also personalize your emails with product imagery and descriptions, which can increase customer engagement and satisfaction, lower customer abandonment rates, and boost the likelihood of a purchase.

Create outstanding customer loyalty programs

Loyalty programs can be a great way to improve retention by giving existing customers an incentive to stay with you. Most SaaS companies have points, miles, or other types of reward systems in place to incentivize new customers to sign up and use their products and services. With Salesforce, you can boost Customer Retention and you can customize these programs for existing customers, including special offers, discounts, or even the ability to redeem points for gifts. Customers appreciate the personalized experience and will likely be more loyal and engaged if they feel appreciated and rewarded for their business.

Re-engage inactive customers with Marketing Automation

In the age of data-driven marketing, it’s easy to fall into the trap of treating all customers equally and blasting them with the same marketing messages. However, when a certain percentage of customers fall into the “transient” category, it’s important to re-engage them with a personalized marketing strategy. With Salesforce, you can automate a lot of the marketing process, including lead gen, lead building, email marketing, and social media campaigns. You can also use Hubot to create a “customer bot” that converses with customers, offering them real-time, personalized content. For example, you can set up automation such that when a customer chats with a Salesforce representative, the chat transcript automatically appears in the customer’s Hubot, helping to engage them with your brand and upselling them on products and services.

Boost Customer Retention with AI-driven insights & reports

When it comes to increasing retention, it’s important to use data to identify which customers are likely to churn and offer re-engagement strategies to encourage them to stay. With Salesforce, you can use built-in analytics and workflows to drive insights, create reports and re-engage inactive customers. Let’s say you manage a dental practice, and you want to identify who is likely to churn. Use the Dentist Profile view to find any customers who haven’t visited your office in the last three years. Now, use the Customer Detector and Upsell tools to re-engage them. You can deliver upsells, send reminders, and even upsell new customers with a Hubot chatbot.

Be realistic and identify customers that are likely to churn

Sometimes you have to be honest with your customers about the challenges they face in keeping their business. Yes, some customers might be unrealistic and not factor in the cost, challenges, and challenges that come with managing a new business or switching employers. But, you also have to be realistic and identify which customers are likely to churn. And remember, the goal of retention strategies is not to acquire new customers but to keep the ones you have. When it comes to identifying which customers are likely to churn, you need a data-driven approach. Get all your customer data organized and ready to go. Use the Customer Profiles views to find customers who are inactive, have a low lifetime value, or have a high cancellation rate. Now, create a list of these customers and determine if there are any retention strategies that can be used to encourage them to stay.

Boost Customer Retention by upselling (and cross-selling) to existing customers

Customers who have been with you for a while and have purchased a variety of products and services are often referred to as “power customers.” If you want to build a strong relationship with your power customers, you need to create a customer-centric culture that is focused on customer service and retention. Salesforce offers many tools for helping you build a stronger relationship with your existing customers and re-engage inactive ones. The first step is to make sure that your customer service practices are truly representative of your customer service culture.