Build a Client Reactivation Strategy to Bring Back Lost Customers

How many of your customers come back to purchase on a repeat basis? Do you have a segment of customers that lay dormant and only purchase once? These are the people that you should actively target with a client reactivation strategy.

Acquiring new customers is never easy. It often takes a sizable investment in both money and time to turn cold leads into buying customers.

Knowing that, it only makes sense to maximize the profit from all of your existing customers. This includes making sure that they continue to come back and make purchases multiple times.

Client Reactivation is creating a strategy that brings dormant clients back to the business to make another active purchase.

What are Dormant Customers?

All businesses have a list of customers that they have worked with in the past. Some of them are active buyers that have either just made a purchase or do so on a regular basis. Others are “dormant”, meaning that they have not made a purchase recently.

Defining dormant customers is based on the individual business and their expected buying patterns. For example, a Christmas decor company may expect customers to make an average of one purchase per year.

If they see that a previous customer has not bought anything in two or three years, they may classify them as dormant.

On the other hand, a bar may see their patrons to come in for happy hour once per month. A dormant customer could then be classified as any previous customer that has not come in for over three or four months.

A real estate agent may have an average repeat purchase rate of every 5 to 7 years. They have a much longer purchasing cycle than other businesses, but it is just as important to keep previous customers engaged.

The key for a real estate agent is to reactivate previous customers at the right time so that they don’t miss a cycle.

Identifying Your Dormant Customers

In order to reactivate your dormant customers, you first have to identify who they are.

To do this, start by determining the normal purchasing frequency of your average customer.

This could be weekly, monthly, or yearly, but figure out what to expect from your most loyal customers.

Once you have a baseline of what your active customers look like, you can compare that to see how many deviate.

This means that you need to have a system for tracking all of your customers and flagging ones who are not actively making purchases.

Make sure your CRM software is able to track your customer purchasing history and separate out inactive ones. If you don’t have software that can automatically do this for you, use a simple spreadsheet.

Create a list of everyone who has made a purchase along with the purchase date. Using a few filters, you can easily find the customers who have not made a recent purchase.

Why Reactivate Previous Customers?

After you have identified your inactive customers, the goal is to get them interested in your business again so that they make another purchase. Since they have already bought from you in the past, it should be much easier to bring them back, provided they had a good first experience.

Bottom line, they don’t need as much education or warming to get them interested in purchasing again. This means less marketing, time, and effort to make another sale. Reactivating customers is one of the best ways to make an easy sale with limited effort.

Of course, previous customers will only be willing to buy again if they loved your product or service and had a great experience. If they were less than thrilled the first time, it will be harder to get them back.

If they had a mediocre experience the last time, it may still be possible to reactivate them using a strategy that shows that you are trying to make it better for them.

This usually includes listening and understanding their feedback, then making changes. You could also offer a discount or coupon that is hard to resist.

Use a Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey to gather feedback on their previous experience and see what their experience was. This data can then be coupled with their last purchase date to create a better customer profile.

How to Reactivate Customers

The goal of an effective client reactivation strategy is to remind dormant customers of the value that your company can provide them. Hopefully, you already formed a relationship when they bought the first time and can build from there.

To do this, simply reach out to them, remind them of your products, and provide some value to entice them to come back.

Here are a few of our top tips to reactivate your previous customers.

Reach Out Quickly

The longer you wait, the harder it will be to reactivate a previous customer. Even with the best experience, their memory will fade and it will be harder to convert them to a repeat buyer.

They are also more likely to have found a competitor or a different solution to their problem. That means you need to move quickly to reach out as soon as you determine that they are dormant.

Set criteria for when a customer becomes inactive for your company and then take action as soon as they hit that mark.

You should also form an ongoing relationship with open communication channels so that it is not strange when you try to reactivate them.

Form a Relationship

Don’t wait until you want them to buy again to start communicating with them. If you expect a customer to make a purchase approximately once per month, don’t wait a full month until you reach out to them.

Instead, form an open relationship with them that will make it natural for them to be reminded of your company and make another purchase.

This can be done through regular email or direct mail newsletters that provide useful information. Take advantage of social media to do the same, providing value mixed with entertainment.

Get your previous customers on your list and use that to build a real relationship so that they trust you.

Use Multiple Communication Channels

As you look to communicate with your customers, don’t forget to use multiple channels.

Email is generally the easiest, fastest, and cheapest way to communicate, but it isn’t always effective.

People can ignore them, send them straight to the spam folder, or simply not check their email for days.

On top of using email, change it up by using social media, SMS, direct mail, and video to reach out effectively.

Capture their attention and you’ll be able to get your message across much easier.

Make an Irresistible Offer

To entice a customer to come back, make them an offer that they can’t refuse. Give them a coupon, discount, or bundle offer that will be hard to say no to.

Separate out your offers for previous customers so that they are special and aren’t the same as a brand new customer. They have already paid you in the past, so it’s a win-win to give them another bonus offer to get them hooked again.

Reward your buyers and they will continue to be loyal customers in the long run.

Automate Repeat Sales

Make it easy for customers to buy again. If you can, use auto-renewals and monthly payment plans to create an automated income stream.

Subscription plans make it easy for customers to continue to pay regularly and help to reduce churn. If you aren’t able to structure your payment options as ongoing, simplify the checkout process as much as possible.

Think the Amazon one-click checkout button and try to mimic a simplified purchase process on your website.

Customize Your Offers to Individual Segments

Collect data on your customers and get to know them. Understand their preferences, what they are interested in, how they buy, and how they engage with your company.

The more information you have, the better you’ll be able to segment and target them. Break your customers into different segments and send them offers tailored to their preferences.

Putting it All Together

You may be doing part of this already, but take a step back to design a complete plan that puts it all together. Build your customer list and collect as much data as you can on them so that you can better understand their motivation.

Separate out your customers based on buying habits and demographics, and then offer them something valuable to come back. Send out your offer using multiple communication channels to be as effective as possible.

Over time, you should see a difference in your repeat purchase rate and see more active buyer history. Now get started identifying your dormant customers and develop a strategy to reactivate them!