What does mission critical mean? According to the Cambridge Dictionary, mission-critical means, “extremely important or necessary for a company, activity, etc. to operate successfully.” We all know that customers are essential to the existence of our businesses, but are we optimizing our customer list as if it’s essential to the survival of our business? Many businesses don’t maintain a list of past and present customers, which stunts business growth and customer acquisition. Here are a few missions (AKA reasons) that make having an organized, digital customer list a necessary tool for growing your business.
Mission 1: Never Forget a Customer or Project
Have you ever had a potential customer tell you that someone referred them to your business, but you don’t remember the referring party or the project you worked on for that person? Has someone reached out for an update on a previous project, but you have no clue who they are and what the job was? Between the number of customers you have served and all the details that go into every project, it can be difficult to remember every single one.
That’s where your digital customer list comes in handy. Since you are the best contractor in the world, you knew to keep all your customers and projects within your bidding software. You can easily search the name of your unknown caller and find the details on the project. Then you look like the most fantastic contractor who has a memory like an elephant! This makes your customer feel so special that you remembered them, and they’ll likely tell all their friends and family that they should hire you.
Mission 2: Create a Steady Project Pipeline
So, the above mission helps you look like you have an awesome memory, but this mission will help out your prior customers’ memories. By keeping all your previous customers’ contact information on hand, you can easily keep in regular contact with them. There are two primary ways to communicate that aren’t intrusive but will still help keep your business top of mind. One way is to send out snail mail; the second is to send emails.
Read: How Do Field Services Businesses Provide Great Customer Experiences?
With an organized, up-to-date customer list, you will easily be able to find addresses to send a post card or quick note to remind customers you are readily available. This doesn’t have to be a monthly project – you could send out holiday cards and maybe a postcard wishing customers a fun summer. The great thing about sending personalized cards or letters is that so few people do that anymore, let alone businesses. Sending mail to your customers makes your business stand out and helps them remember who you are and the quality services you provide!
If you are already sending estimates or invoices via email to your customers, you can now send holiday-focused messages or special maintenance tips. If you’re worried about overwhelming customers, you can send emails as infrequently as on a quarterly basis. Regardless of cadence, keeping lines of communication open will help customers remember who to call or refer when your services are needed – you!
Mission 3: Faster and More Accurate Quotes
It might seem strange, but keeping lists of your prior customers and archives of the estimates that you had sent them will help with accurate bidding on future projects. Sometimes it helps to be able to duplicate an estimate or bid, especially for a repeat customer or a similar project. While there will surely be past projects that were more unique, complicated, and aren’t likely to happen more than once, sometimes they do. When that happens, you’ll be able to find that past project easily through your customer list within your bidding software to get ready for the current difficult project.
When you have the ability to find the simple projects easily through your customer list within your bidding software, you’ll find it quickly makes your life easier. Especially when your bidding software also includes an item list of your most-used items and their pricing. ‘Wow’ your customers by being able to quickly give them an accurate estimate for a project by looking up a prior similar project.
Your customer list is mission critical to the success of your business. In today’s world, keeping your list within your bidding software will help you stay organized, remember all your project and customer details, communicate with past and present customers, and win future customers.
