If you’ve visited our blog or received our Hints & Tips newsletter recently, you may have noticed that we’ve been talking a lot about the different ways small businesses can WOW! their customers.
- How To Get Your First 100 Customers Without
- How To Get Your First 100 Customers Service
- How To Get Your First 100 Customers Get
Your first 100 customers. The first 100 people that use your product are validation, yes. They prove that you've made something that other people actually want.
A WOW! moment is an experience that leaves a lasting impression on your customers.
In some cases, a WOW moment will involve a well thought out marketing campaign designed to increase loyalty and boost repeat business. But many of these moments will also happen during the smaller interactions you have with customers — whether through a positive interaction with your staff, or a helpful tip they receive in your latest email newsletter.
All of these WOW moments — no matter how big or how small — will play a critical role in building customer relationships, which can lead to repeat business and valuable word-of-mouth referrals for your business.
Customer service, like any aspect of business, is a practiced art that takes time and effort to master. All you need to do to achieve this is to stop and switch roles with the customer. Now, with that in mind, here are three ideas for finding your first 100 “beta test” customers: 1. Seek out your competitors’ press. If your startup takes an existing product concept and improves. To succeed in converting users to paying customers, there needs to be enough value in the free product for users. So much so that they love it and tell others about it. But there needs to be more value in it to persuade customers to upgrade. Find the first 100 customers for your startup. To get started pick one of the 29 methods listed above.
We wanted to find out how small businesses were providing unique and memorable experiences for their customers — so we asked “How do you WOW! your customers?”
We heard some great stories and received tons of helpful tips. To give you inspiration for creating your own WOW moment, we compiled a list of our favorite ideas:
“We offer a complete Administrative and Concierge service — whatever needs organizing, our answer’s YES!”
Christina Moore, Complete Organisation
“Blowing them away with creative designs that bring their vision to life and take their brand to an entirely new level.”
Shannon Beth, {sb}Cre8tive
“Pictures, pictures, and pictures…We try to make our customers take a BITE out of their cell phones or computers. Making them laugh helps too!”
“Some things I do to WOW my customers are providing beautiful gift wrap free of charge (my gifts are works of art!), I allow them to pay their paintings over time, I will help them hang their artwork and allow them to take them home and see how they look — out on approval. I do everything I can to make it possible for them to have original paintings and pottery in their homes. When it comes down to it — it’s the service you provide that can make the difference in you and another artist.”
Marsha Owens Clements, Marsha Clements Artist
“On days like Small Business Saturday we extend our hours — we open early and stay late — and give out promotional tote bags with incentives for people to come back into the store to do more shopping. It’s really fun for our customers, and us as well.”
Dawn Noble, La Provence
“Offer small tokens of appreciation for brand evangelists. For the fans that consistently engage on your social networks, reward them with special discounts and giveaways. For those regular customers, support charities that are near and dear to their hearts by donating event proceeds or a portion of sales from products or services. Feature customer stories on your digital content and with media. Often businesses lose sight of the fact that the personal stories of their customers can bring awareness to the culture of their business. Your product or service may have helped to bring joy to a customer’s life.”
Jennifer Smiga, inBLOOM Communications
“Never accepting that what we do now is good enough; always trying to bring the next big idea for our customer.”
“Honesty.”
Liam MacDonald, Gastropub No 29
“I use my Constant Contact newsletter to announce my monthly giveaways — prizes include free painting workshops, original paintings, instructional DVDs, and prints. After I announce the winners, I pick runners up to receive “extra” prizes, the response has been great!”
Nancy Medina, Nancy Medina Fine Art
“I celebrate my online customers in my Vintage Housewares & Home Decor Shop. For every 100th sale I reach in My Vintage Alcove on Etsy, I sell that item at 50% off. It is an exciting milestone for me and an exciting moment for that shopper. The experience creates a WOW moment for them, especially the new customer to my shop. I use Constant Contact to notify my current customers of that upcoming moment as an additional way to keep my business noticed. I also use Facebook to keep the numbers up-to-date. This exciting WOW moment is about to happen again in my shop!”
Michelle Nicholson, My Vintage Alcove
“The most important WOW is listening to the subtle comments people make in dealing with them. They will tell you what they are concerned about. Anything you can do and sometimes it is very small to make them feel like a VIP is important. My industry has a trade show that I can bring my clients to twice a year… Look for the opportunity to create a WOW moment each day and you will be on the right track to creating a legacy business. Business is hard enough that if you are not creating something to last beyond you, you are wasting your time.”
Matt Davidson, Logo Dynamics
“Sharing useful content.”
“We all know that first impressions are extremely important and you only get one shot at it. However, over the years I have found that the last impression is sometimes more meaningful and perhaps is longer lasting. When I collect or quiz a first time customer about the experience they’ve had, I’ve found that this statement, “Let me know if I can ever help you!” as they walk out leaves a forever impression and creates my WOW moment for my new customers…and old.”
Rick Mitchell, Art Academy Live
“What works for me, as a religious nonprofit, are stories. Stories capture attention especially if told in the first person. One needs to hear and see what you see and feel some of what you’re feeling in a given situation. Just news and facts are not attractive to readers. A picture and a story capture immediately people’s attention.”
Rick Evans, Maebenvio
“We do two things to differentiate MURCON from everyone else and provide a WOW! moment for prospects and customers. When presenting seminars we give everyone at the beginning of the presentation a bag of gourmet microwave extra butter popcorn with a printed label attached to it that says “Give your marketing a “POP” with Constant Contact Engagement Marketing Services”. Second, when a company becomes a customer, we add them to the MURCON VIP CLUB. The VIP CLUB gets a special newsletter each month with high value content that the other messages we send out do not contain. That’s WOW value!”
Tom Murphy, Murcon Internet Marketing
“I have a marketing firm and when I take on a new client, I’m given multiple logins for their website, social media, etc. I look to see when that client’s birthdays are and send them a birthday gift! I love it because they never expect it! :)”
Lindsay Higgins, Leave it to Lindsay
“We use the WOW the customer concept in customer service, how can we be different and better not cheaper. We receive email alerts from UPS when our products are delivered to our customers. Then we call each customer to alert them that their product is in the building and who signed for it, so if it is needed for production or a repair to production equipment they can handle it quickly. Sometimes items are signed for and they just sit on someone’s desk or on the delivery dock and the person or department that needs the item/s does not even know they are in the building. So WOW the customer and alert them that their item has arrived and where it is in the building, WOW.”
Rocco Panetta, Plastic Machinery & Parts
“Besides Constant Contact and other existing (and new) methods of social media connection with our customers (and potential customers), I like to also include a bit of old-fashioned customer service in our mix. I read trade magazines to keep up with what is happening in our industry and I will often see articles about our customers in these magazines. When I am done with the magazine I will tear out the articles, write a quick handwritten note, and drop the article into an envelope, hand-address it, and mail it to our customer. On more than one occasion, I have gotten a positive comment back from our customers about how much they enjoyed getting an extra copy of the article in the mail. This is something small, only takes a few minutes, but stands out to our customers. After all, a little fun “snail-mail” stands out in our tech-filled world. Besides, I view our customers as friends and love doing something nice for my friends!”
Shannon M. Kuhrt, M&M Wintergreens Inc.
“I go above and beyond to help my customers and put 100 percent into everything I do big or small. I love my work which shows through.”
Nicky Ratcliff, Virtually u
“We developed a business model and culture that supports and promotes product quality. It’s very common to hit the streets with a high quality product and before long, end up in a price war that leads to slashing prices followed by a necessary drop in quality to offset the decrease in revenue. Lesson here is to not underestimate a client’s capacity to pay a higher price for a quality product. If it is established that the competition produces marginal quality, why follow suit?”
Fabian Luna, The Lead Republic
Share your WOW! moment.
How do you WOW your customers? Let us know in the comments below!
Getting the first 1,000 customers will not guarantee your success, but it will you give you a chance to get some real-world feedback -- and maybe even pay some bills at the same time!
As a startup, your biggest challenge is to get customers on board and getting the first 1,000 always takes the most work. You’re still learning what works while building up repeatable processes that scale. Getting the first 1,000 customers will not guarantee your success, but it will you give you a chance to get some real-world feedback -- and maybe even pay some bills at the same time!
Related: 6 Tips for Finding the Right Prospects and Getting in Front of Them
How To Get Your First 100 Customers Without
Here are a few tips on how to reach this goal:
1. Set up a waiting list
A waiting list is a great way to build early buzz as people always want to be first in line for a new product. This works extremely well for online services and mobile apps, particularly if you offer incentives for people to sign up, such as a free account for three months.
Look at the masterly work of Mailbox, which managed to build up a huge waiting list of over 800,000 people. Their secret? They used a clever user interface to tell people how many others were in front of them and how many were behind them in the line to use the app. This addictive interface gave people a hit of dopamine each time they checked the app and saw they were closer to the front.
2. Use your personal network
Traditional word of mouth is still powerful way to get new customers on board. Tell your family, friends and colleagues about your product and ask them to spread the word. Don’t be shy -- there’s nothing wrong with asking for a favor. If you have a consumer-focused product, there is no easier or quicker way to get your first 30 customers than just asking people you know!
3. Target online publications
Just like bloggers, online publications can help you reach a huge new audience. Pick one or two relevant publications that make sense for your business. Spend time selling them on your product and offer them something unique, such as exclusive coverage of your product launch.
A great tip is to follow journalists on Twitter for a while and get a sense of the type of content they write. Then you’ll find clever ways to connect your product to a theme that interests them. Attentiv did exactly this, and got a great launch story in Fast Company.
4. Get bloggers on your side
Bloggers and other online influencers have huge audiences. Even better, their readers trust them. Reach out to bloggers on sites such as mine Tomoson and ask them to review your product. You can drive huge numbers of new prospects this way. Online reviews can often keep on driving sales for years into the future, as people track them down in search results. Even small blogs can often drive hundreds of sales over time, particularly when the review is thoughtful and well written.
How To Get Your First 100 Customers Service
Related: The Secret to Winning Customers and Growing Your Business
5. Build suspense
How To Get Your First 100 Customers Get
Suspense is an excellent way to build excitement before you launch. Create a drip feed of information about your upcoming product. This will make people curious and want to know more -- particularly if you reveal the details a little bit at a time. The more you give away, the less interesting it becomes. Try to get people excited, but without giving so much context that people are bored and move on.
6. Work with early adopters
Your first customers are the most important. They bought your product for a reason, so you can learn a huge amount from them. Create a personal relationship with them and listen to what they say. You’ll get great insights you can use, and they’ll tell other people about your product. Early adopters usually have smart opinions about products and have a good sense of the market, so always be sure to pay careful attention to them.
7. Create high-quality content
Content marketing is a great way of acquiring new customers. By creating genuinely useful content and giving it away for free, you can drive visitors to your site and also establish yourself as a thought leader. If you have the budget, hire a good writer. Buffer CEO Leo Widrich managed to get 100,000 customers just from writing guest posts on other people’s sites. Those same articles will still be delivering hundreds, maybe thousands, of new customers each month -- with no additional effort.
8. Offer a free product option
Many successful online startups use a “freemium” model to get users on board. This lets people try your product with no risk, which can encourage them to sign up for the paid service or product. However, make sure you strike a balance. Don’t cripple your free option, but keep enough back to make people want to upgrade.
Dropbox is one example of a product that gets this right, giving you enough free storage to get you invested in its ecosystem and invite your friends to join and collaborate. Before you know it, your Dropbox is full and you’re handing over your card details.
9. Incentivize customers to sell your product
Customers can be your best salespeople – they already know the value of your product. Give them a reason to get other people to sign up, and you can drive impressive growth. You can even make this work with a “freemium” model: offer a free upgrade to your paid service for three months as an incentive.
Related: How to Acquire Customers Without a Marketing Budget (Infographic)
10. Speak at conferences
It may seem a bit old school but speaking at conferences is an excellent way of getting exposure and customers for your new startup. Become an expert on your subject, and then contact event organizers and offer to speak. Just make sure to get in touch early, as conference agendas are usually locked down six to 12 months before the event.
Neil Patel spoke at 239 conferences and discovered that the best strategy is to avoid speaking to your peers and speak to potential customers instead. If you’re an SEO, for example, don’t go to an SEO conference where everyone is already an expert in what you do. Instead, go to a gambling event and show them how to get new customers. In the case of Neil, this led to a $100,000-a-month contract.
11. Online advertising
Online advertising can be an effective way of driving traffic to your startup’s website. It doesn’t have to be expensive -- $1,000 with Google AdWords can go a long way. If you don’t have experience with this, then hire a pro: keyword selection and ongoing optimization are incredibly important.
12. Test, test and test again
Once you do start to drive significant traffic to your website, then it’s time to focus on converting visitors into customers. Many different factors can affect your conversion rates -- ranging from website design to pricing. Try out different things and see which ones work best. For example, you can use Google Analytics Content Experiments to try out different landing pages.
13. Affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is where you get other websites to promote your products in return for a commission on sales. This typically works best for information products, such as online courses, because you can offer affiliates high commissions without any product cost. There are sites that make this easy – such as Rakuten Affiliate Network, Commission Junction or ClickBank.
Related: 4 Ways to Extend Customer Service Beyond Your 1-800-Number