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A leading aggregation group has identified how brokers can easily increase customer referrals.
eChoice national sales manager Blake Buchanan said eChoice brokers who utilise SMS contact at key stages in the customer life-cycle increase both the quality of their client relationships and the quantity of referrals coming in.
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“Establishing a feedback tool that isn’t too onerous for customers to react to is the key for brokers to understand the client experience – and determine ways to improve it,” Mr Buchanan said.
“This contact creates an immediate emotional trigger, resulting in a response and then ultimately leading to a significant increase in the number of customer referrals for those brokers.”
Mr Buchanan said SMS and hand-held devices are making customer touch-points easier, noting that the shift from email to SMS has seen response rates increase by 4.5 times.
“This is a clear illustration that brokers who don’t utilise this simple everyday technology to ask for client feedback may never realise what they are missing out on,” he said.
“Brokers should never underestimate the power of making at least one post-contact communication to clients.
“This emotional trigger for customers makes them think about our broker and their relationship with them – and as our figures show, leads many to refer their broker to others.”
From July to December 2015, eChoice reported a Net Promoter Score (NPS) of just over 33 per cent based on contact made at various stages of the customer life-cycle – above the average of -6 per cent for the financial services industry.
Mr Buchanan said the NPS can be used as a “full cycle feedback loop” for brokers wanting to improve their businesses through smarter database segmentation.
“Shrewd brokers should be using the NPS as a business tool to identify those customers that are the ‘champions’ of their business,” he said.
“By doing this they can focus their energy on asking for referrals or assistance through word-of-mouth recommendations, testimonials and online reviews.”
