How to Get Repeat Customers: Strategies for Service Businesses
Looking to cut down on your marketing costs without sacrificing revenue? Then learning how to get repeat customers is the way to go.
Repeat customers cost significantly less than acquiring new customers. And they’re more likely to try new services and refer you to their friends and family members. That means more money in your pocket, more jobs in your schedule, and less time spent looking for leads.
Use these tips and tactics to build a retention strategy that helps you target returning customers and grow your service business.
Here’s how to get repeat customers:
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Make it easy to work with you
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Offer customer loyalty incentives
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Go above and beyond with customer service
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Have a plan for disputes
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Manage customer information in one place
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Follow up with old customers
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Send thank you notes
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Build relationships
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Build an online presence
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Ask for feedback
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Track your efforts
1. Make it easy to work with you
Whether a customer is looking for a quick cleaning service before an event or urgently needs to have a burst pipe repaired, the last thing they want to do is go back and forth with a service provider about available dates and times.
Jobber’s online booking feature makes it easy for customers to book appointments right into their calendars. They can also approve quotes, view appointment details, make payments, and send referrals—all on their own time.
Plus, Jobber makes it easy for you to process online payments and send quotes and invoices via email or text.
2. Offer customer loyalty incentives
Encourage existing customers to come back by demonstrating you value their customer loyalty.
For example, offer a small discount to repeat customers or develop a referral program to reward loyal customers who send new contracts your way. You could also use a points system or give customers who book repeat jobs an early bird discount.
Not only does this encourage repeat business, but it shows loyal customers you genuinely appreciate and value them. In turn, this helps bring in new customers and boosts your reputation as a quality service provider.
3. Go above and beyond with customer service
If you want past customers to remember you when they need another service, you have to stand out with excellent customer service. Go above and beyond the customer satisfaction status quo to leave a lasting impression.
Returning phone calls is something a customer expects. However, if you’re working at an elderly lady’s house and you bring their garbage can up from the street, that would be more of an unexpected and awesome experience.
Look for small ways to show existing customers you care that don’t cost you any extra time or money.
For example, the next time you’re at a customer’s property, bring in their Amazon package before you mow the lawn or change their smoke alarm battery while you clean their house.
This plays into your overall customer service strategy, where you should also prioritize things like:
- Showing up to appointments on time
- Returning text messages, phone calls, and emails in a timely manner
- Respecting the customer’s home and property
- Being professional, personable, and polite
4. Have a plan for disputes
Excellent customer service doesn’t only apply to good times. It also means handling disputes and issues with a clear head when they arise.
In many cases, a customer is more likely to remember how you addressed a problem over what happened in the first place.
For example, let’s say an existing customer leaves you a bad review online saying they weren’t happy with the pressure washing service you provided. You have three options:
- You can ignore them, showing them and potential customers that you don’t care about, or pay attention to, online complaints.
- You can respond negatively, leaving a poor impression of you and your company.
- You can respond positively, apologizing to the customer and offering to fix the problem.
With the right response, you have an opportunity to turn an unhappy customer into a repeat and happy customer.
READ MORE: How to respond to negative customer feedback
5. Manage customer information in one place
If you don’t have your customers’ contact information, it’s going to be hard to reach out to them for a repeat purchase.
Use Jobber’s client manager to:
- Store and organize customer contact details to ensure you have the right phone number and email address.
- Review past jobs to see what services they booked in the past, how they paid, and when their last service was.
- Inform follow-ups and marketing strategies by tracking when an existing customer may need maintenance or whether you should send them a reminder to book seasonal services.
- Document customer communications, like emails and text messages, so you have a record of when they contacted you, what for, and whether it impacts future jobs. For example, if they asked you to close the gate after a lawn service to keep the dog from getting out.
That way, you’ll always know who to contact, when to reach out, and what for. This means you can tailor your outreach to each customer, helping you to use the right services, messaging, and promotions to win another repeat customer.
6. Follow up with old customers
Repeat business won’t always come to you. Sometimes you have to go get it for yourself.
Following up with past customers is one of the best ways to get returning customers and repeat business. It reminds them that they might need your services, leading potential repeat sales.
With email marketing software like Jobber campaigns, you can send automated messages to customers when they meet the conditions you set.
For example, follow up with previous customers to:
- Remind them of an annual service, like HVAC maintenance, yard clean up, or holiday light installation
- Let them know about seasonal offerings, like snow removal or lawn maintenance
- Offer them a discount on a service they booked in the past
From a tree care perspective, let’s say you’re talking about fall/spring inspections of your trees and you need to do pruning removals. One example of an arborist email that we’ll send out is in the fall, schedule your fall tree inspection.
This helps you target repeat sales on autopilot, saving you time, making you money, and ensuring you contact the right customers at the right times.
7. Send thank you notes
Thank you notes are a simple way to show your appreciation to a customer and stay top of mind.
And they work even better when you include a small discount or promotion to encourage repeat purchase.
The next time you finish a job, try sending a quick thank you note to leave a lasting impression and set yourself apart from the competition.
8. Build relationships
As a service provider, chances are you work on your customer’s personal properties. And no matter how polite and professional you are, having a stranger in their home can feel uncomfortable for some customers.
Building a strong relationship from the beginning is key to developing trust and making them feel at ease. And it doesn’t need to be done through grand gestures.
Instead, it’s the small things that’ll make a standout customer experience. Like remembering to latch the gate so their dog doesn’t get out, sending a text instead of ringing the doorbell so you don’t wake the baby, or scheduling the same crew to complete each service.
We’re introducing new employees via email. So a photo of the new employee (we call ’em team members) and then a profile, maybe they like dogs. You’d be amazed. People love that kind of stuff. They want to know who’s coming to their house.
When customers know you can be relied on to respect their homes and preferences, they’re more likely to become returning customers—and refer you to their friends and family members.
9. Build an online presence
If customers can’t connect with you, they may forget you exist.
Having an online presence like a website, Facebook page, and other social media accounts helps you indirectly stay in touch with customers. You can provide service-related tips, advice, maintenance reminders, and before and after images to keep you top of mind.
That way, when they need to hire someone to install a new dishwasher, they’ll remember the post you made last week about how to clean a dishwasher filter and reach out.
READ MORE: Facebook post ideas for service businesses
10. Ask for feedback
Use customer feedback surveys and reviews to ask customers for their thoughts after a job. This will help you to understand what you do well, and how you can improve their customer satisfaction.
Customers will appreciate having an opportunity to voice their opinions customer feedback.
When they see the input being put to use—either by posting positive reviews on your website and social media or using constructive feedback to make changes—they’ll feel valued and will consider booking with you again.
Feedback will also help you to understand why some customers don’t become a repeat customer. You can use this information to adjust your strategy and make improvements where necessary to increase your chances of getting repeat business down the road.
11. Track your efforts
At the end of the day, how you get a repeat customer doesn’t matter as long as it works. But the only way to tell if you’re successful is by analyzing your results.
Using an AI tool like Jobber Copilot, you can track your customer data and get important insights about them, like how much of your business is made up of repeat customers, what you can do to provide a more seamless online customer experience, and tips for improving your customer retention strategy.
That way, you won’t waste time on unsuccessful customer retention strategies and can focus your efforts on what customers are actually responding to.
Originally published in December 2019. Last updated on November 14, 2024.