When do you engage with your customers? Is it only when you want to sell them something? If so, consider extending the conversation. Customers are more loyal when they feel that you care about them personally, not just the bottom line, so here are three ways to keep the conversation rolling. 

1. Touch base . . . just to touch base.  

Send personalized notes and postcards at critical anniversaries. Celebrate customers’ birthdays, but also significant business relationship anniversaries, such as the date someone first becomes a customer. Some companies make these touches by email, but personalized cards and letters have far more impact. There is something more powerful about a beautiful personalized message that arrives in a printed envelope than “Happy Birthday!” in an 8-point subject line. 

2. Provide valuable information.  

If you continue to receive real estate postcards even after you’ve purchased a home, it’s not that your realtor forgot to take you out of their database. It’s part of a growing trend of long-term customer retention that all market verticals can learn from. Realtors often send postcards every few months or at the change of seasons. They might offer suggestions for improving the curb appeal of your home, tricks for spring decluttering, or ideas for winterizing your garage. When your friends are looking for referrals or when your children are looking to purchase their first home, they want to be the first one you recommend.  Maybe they are onto something. How could you use this strategy to your advantage? 

3. Don’t let them get away. 

Do you know when customers are starting to fade away? Maybe they buy fewer products from you, or maybe they do so less frequently. Perhaps they stopped engaging on social media or changed their email address and didn’t re-up with your newsletter. Pay attention to which of your customers remain engaged and reach out to those who are not. This allows you to re-engage lagging relationships before it’s too late. Once a pattern of non-engagement becomes entrenched, it’s much harder to change. 

Everyone wants to be noticed and cared about, and your customers are no different. Love your customers beyond the sale, and they will love you back.