Nurture Your Business Relationships

With all of the advances in technology, the focus on personal relationships has started to fall away. People are communicating through their devices instead of face-to-face on a regular basis. Although that is convenient and enables us to contact more people in a given week, we still need to remember what is important. Nobody is asking you to deny using email, video chats, or texting...we just have to keep in mind that relationships MATTER and they need to be nurtured. Below is a great article from mashable.com. Here are a few great tips on ways to stay in touch while still being effective with time management.

Like any other relationship, the foundation you establish with your client or customer is crucial to how the business relationship will develop over time. It requires taking the time at the start, going the extra mile and paying attention to detail.

Technology has made it easy to copy, paste and send out a mass email to hundreds in minutes. But if you think your customers can’t tell the difference between a personal email and one that’s generated, you’re doing it wrong. Establishing a relationship with a customer can be more timely and costly than maintaining one, but the payoff is worth it in the end.

Customers are more likely to give you their loyalty when they experience consistency and transparency from the initial pitch. They appreciate you being genuine and upfront about your policies — no one likes an half-hearted response or to feel like they’ve been tricked.

The following are some tips and tricks on how to build relationships with your customers from leaders in communications, PR and social media.

“Understanding your clients is so important to building a good relationship – not just trying to fit them into marketing templates – but truly appreciating where they are in the marketplace and how to get them to the next level from the very beginning. The best way to do this is to know them inside and out – it is why we start all our engagements with a Foundation Stage.”

- Cortney Stapleton, executive vice president at Bliss Integrated Communication

“Be a partner, not a service provider. Make sure you understand your client’s business on the inside and out. Sit with the product team to fully immerse yourself and have a deep understanding beyond the talking points.”

- Brooke Hammerling, founder of Brew Media Relations

“It’s more difficult and expensive to gain a new fan than to keep existing fans by engaging them with content. When we do a promotion that we know will result in new fans coming to our page, we alter our content to welcome new fans. We introduce them to our page and show them what we offer. ”

- Christina Dick, community manager at The Martin Agency

“The information you give as a community leader must always be 100% accurate and verifiable, and your policies clearly defined for the audience. If you find yourself bending on the policies or unable to stand up for them, it’s time you reexamine those policies and create something you can stand behind.”

- Morgan Johnston, manager of corporate communication and social media strategist of Jetblue Airways

“Be open-minded. We all have favorite ways of doing things but people respond to openness. If a client really wants to do something one way (or has always done something a certain way) – hold a brainstorm session with folks from all different levels and specialties to groupthink new solutions. Don’t just try to push one way of thinking; sometimes you are there to be a curator and cultivator not always the creator. ”

- Cortney Stapleton, executive vice president at Bliss Integrated Communication

“Encourage honesty with both your customers and employee participants. Customers will only read product reviews if they feel they can be trusted, and that trust needs to be earned. No one will buy a dress with a 5-star rating from a site that seems to only approve 5-star reviews!”

- Maggie Glover, head of community at ModCloth

‍