Sure, 71% of B2B tech marketers cite lead generation as their top content marketing goal — but your content can be used for a lot more than just lead generation. In fact, content can be one of your most powerful weapons for customer retention. And since it’s 6-7 times more costly to attract a new customer than it is to retain an existing customer, anything you can do to improve customer retention levels should be a top priority (if it’s not already).
A 10% increase in customer retention levels results in a 30% increase in the value of the company. (Bain & Co)
While we’ve discussed sales and marketing enablement, we’d like to kick off May by focusing on customer enablement. How can you ensure that your customers are engaging with your brand? How can you help them use your product or service to the best of their ability?
The answer is content. Let’s take a look at some of the content we recommend creating for your customers:
User’s Guides
At the most basic level, you’ll want to make sure you have some sort of product documentation available for your customers — something that can help them learn their way around your product. Consider hosting these on your website and sorting them by category for easy access. Include screenshots and easy walkthroughs so that your users have a resource they can go to when they’re experiencing difficulties. This will make their lives easier, and the lives of your customer support team members.
Checklists & Handbooks
Your users don’t just want to know how to use your product, they want to know how to use it well. This is where best practices and enablement materials come in handy. By creating helpful checklists, handbooks, and worksheets for your customers, you can help your clients get the most out of their investment.
User Forums
An important part of being a resource for your customers is listening to their feedback, whether it’s positive or negative. One way to do this is to set up a forum for your users, where they can collaborate, bounce ideas off of each other, and submit feedback on your product. At Pardot, we use our Idea Exchange to collect ideas for new product features, and many of these ideas have been turned into a reality. Give your customers a voice, and listen when they use it.
Webinars & Videos
For the customers who want to stay up-to-date on best practices information, but aren’t interested in reading through an entire handbook or article, webinars and videos are great options. These are excellent vehicles for delivering best practices information, and can be digested by your customers fairly quickly (and without a ton of effort on their part). Consider hosting monthly webinars that cover topics ranging from beginner to more advanced, or making short videos that can be disseminated to your customers easily and quickly.
What other resources have you found valuable for customer retention? We’d love to hear your thoughts in your comments!