Capturing Customer Attention: 3 Quick Tips

You’re busy. Customers are busy. It’s a disaster waiting to strike… or an opportunity waiting to collide. How you handle it will be your deciding factor.

In order to gain customers nowadays, here are three quick tips to help you in all your customer communication:

TIP 1: BE CONCISE & CLEAR

If you can’t share details of a sale, promote an event, describe a new product arrival or offer a store overview in a concise, easy to understand fashion, then you are doing something wrong. Customers want to quickly know what they are learning about / hearing about / reading about / experiencing and if you can’t deliver these messages concisely, then you should re-evaluate how you are sharing them. For example, can a customer understand what your store sells by your store name or tagline alone? If not, do  you have any clear identity on how they can quickly and concisely understand just what your store sells? Being concise is key to capturing customer attention, as it takes only seconds for someone to decide they want to get engaged or leave your store / website / social media page all together.

TIP 2: BE CONSISTENT IN YOUR BRANDING

What does a red bulls eye mean to you? What about that “certain” color blue box with a white ribbon? Hopefully you’re thinking of two strong brands and two strong retailers – Target and Tiffany’s. Both are known for their strong branding and consistent store messaging. As a small retailer, you may not be as widely recognized but that should not stop you from being just as easily recognized from those customers that do know you. Make sure your logo is consistent on your website, in your store, on all marketing materials, via social media and anywhere else you have visibility. Make sure your store taglines, overview, bio and total store messaging is also consistent in it’s at-large communication. Finally, avoid shortcuts that won’t strengthen your branding. Strong branding can help lead to stronger sales.

TIP 3: BE WHERE YOUR CUSTOMERS ARE

And on that note… make sure you know WHO your customers are. Cater to twenty-somethings? Chances are many of your customers are using Instagram more so than Facebook. Cater to crafty moms? Pinterest is likely a place you need to be. Beyond social media, identify where your customers are in your local marketplace. Are they at youth sporting games? Consider being a youth sports team sponsor. Are they active in the charity community? Incorporate cause marketing into your own store strategies. The idea here is to think beyond your store walls and put yourself where your customers are once they leave your store. And don’t forget email marketing… it’s the #1 driver of eCommerce business and helps get folks into stores, as well.

Finally, never lose sight of your customer’s interests. Offer customer surveys, comment cards and simply listen, as well, to what they have to say. Their voice is the heartbeat to your success.