Every client goes through several stages before they become a loyal customer to your business.
The better this experience is for them, the more likely they are to stick with you.
The client journey focuses on marketing and customer service over the five stages of the journey, so it’s important that you have these optimised to your clients.
Stages of the client journey
1. Awareness
This stage is where potential clients are becoming aware of you and your services. Clients will be looking for information or a solution to a problem or need, and so they will be searching for that information via social media and search engines.
At the awareness stage, potential clients will be learning about your website via your web and social media content, and from recommendations from friends and family too. This isn’t the stage for you to hard sell to clients, it’s simply the stage for them to gather the information they need, and your focus should be on answering their questions and building trust. This could be in the form of educating them on what you do, showing them the space where you work, writing blogs on your website, showcasing your team/yourself. Basically, types of content that establishes you as an expert in your industry in order to build client trust.
2. Consideration
In the consideration phase, customers begin to consider your brand as a solution to their problem. They’re comparing your products to other businesses and alternative solutions, so you need to give these potential clients a reason to stick around.
Consideration-stage clients want to see products and services that lean heavily toward solving problems and content that doesn’t necessarily push a sale. At this stage, businesses need to position their solution as a better alternative to what is already out there.
3. Purchase
The purchase stage is also called the decision stage because at this stage clients are ready to make a buying decision. Keep in mind that their decision might be to go with a competing solution, so purchase-stage clients won’t always convert to your business.
As a business, it’s your job to persuade clients at this stage to buy services from you. This is the stage where you provide information on your services, techniques and prices.
4. Retention
The client journey doesn’t end once they make their first purchase with you. Once you’ve converted a client, you need to focus on keeping them around and driving repeat business. Sourcing new clients is often more expensive than retaining existing clients, so this strategy can help you cut down on marketing costs and increase profits.
The key to the retention stage is to maintain positive, engaging relationships between your business and its clients. Try strategies like regular emails, giveaways and competitions, or exclusive events and offers for clients to encourage loyalty.
5. Advocacy
In the advocacy stage, clients are so delighted with you and your services that they spread the word to their friends and family. This goes a step beyond retention because the client is actively encouraging other people to come to your business.
Client journeys don’t have a distinct end because you should always aim to please even your most loyal clients. In the advocacy stage of the client journey, you can offer referral vouchers and discounts, loyalty programs, and special deals for your most active clients to encourage further advocacy.
Benefits of knowing the client journey
Being aware of the client journey helps shed more light on your target audience’s expectations and needs. More specifically, acknowledging the customer journey can help you:
- Understand your client’s behaviour, which will help you to hone your business’ offering.
- You will learn which marketing channels are most effective at reaching different types of clients. And it will help you tailor your marketing to specific target clients too.
- It can help you see and fix issues with your products and services that you might not have noticed before.
- Seeing the client journey helps your business target the most relevant audience for your product or service. Plus, it improves the customer experience and increases engagement.
- Knowing your clients’ journey can help you increase business and loyalty by tailoring and personalising your approach and marketing messages to give your audience exactly what they want.
- Improve client satisfaction and loyalty. Today, 94% of customers say a positive experience motivates them to make future purchases.