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Manufacturer of Hydraulic Presses
New Year’s resolutions on every machine shop list are more clients and greater profits. The best approach is to bring in new customers and get more work from your current clients.
That means marketing with a personal touch, using both face-to-face and digital marketing. Your prospects want to deal with a human being. The more they feel heard and appreciated, the more likely they are to bring their jobs to your machine shop.
Here are 5 tips to increasing business at your shop in 2019.
Make your current customers feel appreciated. One of the simplest is with a card to acknowledge your client’s birthday or an important business milestone. Did they get a mention in one of the trade magazines or websites? Send an email congratulating them!
It’s just the nature of business that invoices will be the most common form of communication they get from you most of the time. Take the time to personalize your interactions with a quick note to make them feel important.
Take each client out for coffee or lunch once every quarter, or even once a year. One-on-one time together is priceless. You get to know what is going on in his life and business. You can use this information in your followup messages through the year.
It feels great to be a person and not a faceless number. Make your interactions with your customers personal and direct. You’ll be the machine shop they come back to again and again.
Offer an incentive for your existing customers when they bring in more work. Tailor the reward to fit the customer’s needs. Consider a discount for specific types of work, priority handling, or a free add-on.
It’s a fact, everyone loves a freebie. Come up with something usable by your clients and affordable for you. It keeps them interested and coming back.
Giving your machine shop the human touch is essential. That’s true for all the places current clients and new prospects come in touch with your business.
Digitally, keep your social media and blog updated. It makes you look like a well run concern. Post photos of current jobs in your shop and speciality projects you’ve completed. Photos get far more attention online that text.
On your website, post photos of your press operators and other staff members. It gives your customers an idea who will be working on their jobs. Show photos of your shop. Provide a map on your website and show where to park. Make it as simple as possible for people to find you.
Make all support calls top priority. Listen carefully to complaints and offer timely remedies, price reductions or other solutions to keep your client happy.
It’s easy to get tied to the shop. But your clients are attending trade shows and business groups. And you should be too. These venues offer excellent networking opportunities.
Buy a booth at the next trade show or exhibit in the area. You’ll have a chance to chat with prospects, meet up with old clients, and find out what people are interested in.
Go to business events in your area. Answer questions and listen to what prospects are looking for in a machine shop. When it’s time to send a job in, they will choose your shop because you took the time to connect with them one-on-one.
Make sure it is simple for your clients to complain, compliment or simply comment on how the job went. Email is quick and easy. If you find a complaint, reply immediately. Do whatever it takes to make your customer satisfied with the work.
Giving your clients a way to be heard, to be taken seriously, is one o the best ways to encourage loyalty. Happy customers are the best source of positive word-of-mouth marketing.
At RK Machinery, we want to help you make the coming year as profitable as possible. We have decades of experience producing innovative, reliable and long-lasting hydraulic presses and equipment.
Call RK Machinery today to find out how we can help your machine shop in 2019.
