What is customer churn?

Customer churn or customer churn rate is the attrition rate of your customers. It is the rate at which your customers have stopped using your products or services. This is usually seen in the percentage of customers who cancel their subscriptions within a period. Customer churn is measured during the customer success stage when the company looks at customer retention numbers. 

Why does customer churn happen?

Several factors could lead to customer churn. Some of them are:

• Need. Sometimes the customer doesn’t need what you are selling anymore.
• Budget. Sometimes your customers may experience a change in their economic status and would begin cutting out what they deem “unnecessary spending”. 
• Price. Your customer could have found a company that provides the same products or services at a cheaper rate. 
• Negative customer experience. When customers have a poor experience of availing of your services (i.e. answers are taking too long, the website is lagging and not intuitive), they will probably look for a different provider. 
• Dissatisfaction. When your products or services repeatedly do not meet expectations, your customers will take their business elsewhere. 

What are the signs of customer churn?

There are usually warning signs when a customer is about to stop their patronage of your services.

• Decreased usage. If your company has a website, you can see how customers use your site. When those numbers start to drop, it could indicate an oncoming churn. 
• Decreased customer satisfaction. When your customers are constantly complaining about your products or customer service, this is a sign of dissatisfaction. Dissatisfied customers tend to take their business elsewhere. 
• Stoppage of feature or subscription. When a customer stops their subscription or stops certain parts of their subscription, it could very well mean that somewhere down the line, they will stop their subscription.

How to Reduce Customer Churn Rate

Below are tips on how to reduce the number of customers walking out of your business’ proverbial door:

Find the reason for the churn 

Let’s say you know there is a leak in your pipes somewhere. What do you do? You look for the line with the leak, and either you plug the hole yourself or get someone to fix your pipes. 

It’s the same with customer churn. You know that your customers are dropping off. It would help if you found out why to address the problem. How do you find out? Ask your customers. Create surveys to pinpoint their issues with your company, and then start developing a strategy to address those issues. Or better yet, actually call them and have a conversation. The addition of a “human element” when having business transactions has been proven to help retain customers. Having an actual human to talk to about their feedback will show your customers that you care. 

Ramp up customer engagement

Make your product an essential part of your customer’s everyday life. An excellent example of this is the Milo campaign. Nestle developed a campaign where they convinced the customers that drinking Milo every day would keep their customers healthy and energized. The ads were so convincing that entire generations have been using the drink every day. 

So how do you do it? Point out why your product addresses their daily needs. Highlight the benefits and ease of use of your products and how they can help make their lives easier. And do not forget to deliver on those promises. Of course, it would help if you had a good, solid effect in the first place, to do this. 

Improve customer service

Customer service plays a huge role in your relationships with your customers. So it’s not just about training your CSRs to be personable and arming them with product knowledge; it is also about using new technology to address customer queries and complaints. 

Have you ever tried to find out more about a product or access certain information about a product you are using, but the company’s website or chat box is giving you the run-around? Doesn’t it get frustrating? It makes you lose patience with the company. In some cases, when customers have had enough, they drop your business altogether. 

If you want to decrease your customer churn rate, ensure that your customers get a positive experience when engaging with your company. 

Freebies and loyalty gifts

Reward customer loyalty by offering them exclusive perks and services. For example, give seasonal gifts to customers. This will be a pleasant surprise for them. Even something as simple as a handwritten gratitude note with their products can make an awful lot of difference. This might even turn your ordinary customer into a lead generator just by them telling their friends all about what your company does for their customers. 

Bottomline

The success of a company strongly relies on the customers. Therefore, it is essential to develop customer success and strong customer relationships, create a solid and proactive customer service team and keep customers engaged and happy. 

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This article has been written by Sophia Young. She recently quit a non-writing job to finally be able to tell stories and paint the world through her words. She loves talking about fashion and weddings and travel, but she can also easily kick ass with a thousand-word article about the latest marketing and business trends, finance-related topics, and can probably even whip up a nice heart-warming article about family life. She can totally go from fashion guru to your friendly neighborhood cat lady with mean budgeting skills and home tips real quick.

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