How do I grow my business REVENUE?

[hooverfactory]

More often than not, I get asked such questions and in my mind I keep saying that, "There's no cheat sheet fella! You just need to believe in TNE - Trial n Error" - this is applicable to startups or aspiring businesses - who are mainly scratching the surface of business growth for the initial 5 years at least.

However, now I feel the time is right to literally sit in one corner and jot down all the learnings I have gathered over the past few (4.5 years) about revenue growth. Nope, this is not a cheat sheet or 'gyaan'. This is something many people at my level think worked for them and might work for the next-gen too!

So, here's presenting the 6 aspects of how customer experience can help you grow your business revenue:

• 24/7 availability – To ensure instant customer query resolution

No one likes to be kept waiting, especially not when there’s a problem that needs to be resolved.

Over 71% of customers aged 16 to 24 think that a quick response will drastically improve the overall customer experience (CX). So, offering 24/7 availability and quickly addressing customer concerns will give you a great competitive edge.

Whether your customers need more information on a certain product, have questions about transactions and shipments, or just a simple concern they’d like you to address, you need to be available for them. Always.

• Hyper-personalization – To enhance customer value

Personalization isn’t a new trend, but it’s never been as vital as it is today. Every customer wants a hyper-personalized experience because it makes them feel appreciated and valued.

And considering the amount of data businesses gather about their customers, a personalized experience is the least that they can offer.

If you want to stay relevant, competitive, and improve your CX, you’ll need to learn about your customers’ online habits, their tastes, likes and dislikes, and their wants and needs.

If you’re new to personalization and figuring out what exactly it is that your customers want, you probably need all the help you can get. And the easiest way to get started with personalizing your marketing and customer experience efforts is through the use of a marketing automation platform.

• Responsiveness – To boost your customer experience efforts

An engaged customer is a loyal customer, and nurturing your relationship with them will be mutually beneficial. The customer will feel valued, while you’ll succeed in selling more products/ services to them.

But how can you keep your customers engaged? One of the simplest ways is through the smart use of social media.

Posting valuable content such as tutorials, educational (and entertaining!) blogs, guides, and more, regularly, will keep them interested. Just remember to use different platforms (and their features) for different purposes.

Guys I don't want to increase the length of the write-up here any further. But the next 3 points are real game changers so please continue reading.

 

[christinak]

@hooverfactory Great notes on customer experience. However, this is just one lever of revenue growth. There are 4 ways to grow business revenue:

1. Increase the number of leads (whether that be walk-in traffic, website, etc.)
2. Increase your conversion rate (which it seems your post is about)
3. Increase average order value (or raise prices)
4. Increase repeat order volume

As you note, customer experience is important as you'll convert a higher % of each lead. Most people focus on #1 (increasing leads). But, focusing on 2-4 maximizes the revenue you get out of each lead in #1. Businesses should really be focusing on incremental increases in all 4 levers. Once 2-4 are optimized, turn up the dial on #1 via advertising and watch the machine work it's magic!

 

[hooverfactory]

@christinak Amazing notes. Thanks for sharing these.

My intent of the write up was to turn marketer's attention towards the importance CX holds. I believe that if your customers (who are visitors in the first phase) do not experience something outstanding with regards to your business then all the points you mentioned might not be completely fulfilled.

Let me know your thoughts around this.

 

[christinak]

@hooverfactory Yes, I certainly agree with what you are saying.

However, your title was about increasing revenue, so I wanted to point out that there are 3 additional levers to achieve that goal.

Too many businesses are transactional. They get the customer in, try to make a sale, and that's that. By utilizing CE, increasing AOV, and increasing repeat order volume, you maximize every sale. Once optimized, this also allows you to spend more to acquire a customer than your competitors because each transaction brings in more profit.

I would also agree that customer experience is the #1 driver for revenue generation. Going back to the original levers in my previous post:

1. More traffic - Excellent CE will create word of mouth marketing and virality, bringing more traffic.
2. Conversion Rate - Excellent CE will increase conversion rate.
3. AOV - Excellent CE can improve AOV as most products do have complementary products or offers that benefit your customer. Excellent CE also can justify the perceived value for price increases.
4. Repeat orders - Excellent CE will make your customers happy to do business with you again.

So in large part, we totally agree.

 

[hooverfactory]

@christinak Awesome!

This sounds great! If I may say, you should write a blog on this. I'll be interested in reading more from you.

 

[christinak]

@hooverfactory Took you up on it and wrote an in depth blog post. Sorry it took so long! https://paulchittenden.com/how-to-grow-revenue-5-levers/

 

[613jono]

@christinak Would you consider preleads in that equation? If you sell skateboard shoes, and you are see the logo everywhere, and you hear about it. It is not exactly a lead since it's not activated until someone actually wants to buy. It's a sort of primer or prelead?

Also where would you put in brand reputation, product reputation as a way to grow revenue? Would you slot it into the marketing funnel?

 

[sea_echols]

@hooverfactory These points are very risky when you are referring to growing revenue. Customer acquisition efforts do not equal increase in revenue. A good chunk of running a business is pure math as well. 24/7 customer service and personalized services are VERY expensive and they don't work for every business model. If you need to hire employees and the LTV of your client is very low then you might not break even.

 

[hooverfactory]

@sea_echols I get your point and understand where you're coming from.
I believe these points will change as per the genre of your business.

However, when it comes to 24x7 customer service, I think it is important because:
a. with businesses going global, your customers are spread all over the world living in different time zones.
b. even if the business is local, people will still have concerns about your product and will look forward to get in touch with you whenever they meet some difficulty.

Let me know if this makes sense to you.

 

[613jono]

@hooverfactory I think the mechanism to increase revenue is to continually accumulate improvements everywhere in the business. More resources spent improving core competency and the top priority items. But trying everywhere in the business to improve and become better for the customer. This may mean cutting waste in operations to lower cost for the customer, cutting useless product features and spend that money in features they want, creating better experience or product. The entire business is to serve and satisfy the customer, and achieve an optimal situation.

I believe it has a lot to do with trying to get little improvements everywhere and a specialization/general effectiveness. Apple being a specialized company on luxury and proprietary tech. Samsung is generally effective all around. So the company has to be like a basketball team, its need to be good everywhere, but it needs to be overall dominant(toronto raptors during their winning championship) or specialized(golden state warrior). They must be able to be dominant and closest to 'perfect'.

I think the general idea is to try to make product, customer experience, and operations as close to perfect as humanly possible. Amazon use to have a small selection that took 1 week to arrive, now it has a huge selection that takes 24 hours to arrive. They look to be trying to cut it down to 6 hours, trying to see if they can own some sort of cashless retail operation / restaurant / grocery store.

 

[hooverfactory]

@613jono Nice analogy of a football team.

I partially agree with what you are saying though.

IMO, working on one aspect of your business first and then going full out and making things work in cohesion works. Else, it's just like - Jack of all, master os none.

Ofc for a business to move ahead it requires all the wheels to move together. But each wheel has to be equally strong, first.

 

[613jono]

@hooverfactory

IMO, working on one aspect of your business first and then going full out and making things work in cohesion works. Else, it's just like - Jack of all, master os none.

Imo it's more about building the business up in a steady and clear way. As long as the business runs efficiently and effectively it can grow randomly. And the business can be a jack of all trades like a Samsung. It just has to be 8.75/10 across the board. Apple in some areas are 10/10, and other areas are 6.5/10.

Ofc for a business to move ahead it requires all the wheels to move together. But each wheel has to be equally strong

I don't know if that is exactly accurate. I think it is more about how getting brand, marketing, product among other things to become very efficient and effective. Really fine tuning these things to be most optimal. Then It's about trying to get some very high return on investment in the branding, marketing and product. Over time to keep pushing them all to a high standard. It all grows naturally and isn't so planned.

 

[hooverfactory]

@613jono Possible. Again, I feel it is the game of business genre.

You make sense!

 

[davetaff]

@hooverfactory My two cents:

To earn more, you need to provide more value.

Refine or improve your product or service. and the market research to see how and IF your prod or serv is even what the market wants. If it isnt, pivot your service or product to actually what your target market wants. Too many business owners spend TOO many years tryin gto push out a product or service that NOBODY WANTs. Never base your product or service off of "what would i like to buy" but rather, "what does my market want to buy, based on hard data and extensive research (that YOU conduct as a business owner).