Too often, I see small businesses that, only focus on disposing of their goods or services, without knowing that, selling the product is only the beginning of the deal.

One of my favorite words when it comes to managing the sales process is future revenue; people rarely think of taking advantage of today’s sales to preserve tomorrow’s, and so they sell, and pretty much end just there.

I think selling to a customer and stopping there is quite myopic.

Every time you sell and allow the customer walk away, without you doing anything to ensure or increase the likelihood that they will return to you for same thing or something else tomorrow, then you are leaving money on the table.

So this week, I asked a dear friend, who’s a fashion designer, how she hoped to preserve future revenue with her new South African client. She replies, ‘nothing’, with a certain tone of bewilderment. I see and hear this misnomer every time with small businesses.

Apart from the fact that there are too many things competing for the purchasing power of your clients, there are also a plethora of competitors in your industry, and technology has made brand switching very effortless. Your business is endangered by default.

What will you do with every sale to keep your customers returning? These things don’t have to cost much, some call it after sale service, some call it customer service, others call it managing customer experience, but I call it preserving future revenue.

According to trend online, globally in 2013, 66% of consumers switched brands or business due to poor customer service, a 4% increase on the previous year. Some 82% of those who switched said the brand could have done something to stop them.

Another research showed that when customers feel satisfied with the service of a business, the feeling is equivalent to the feeling of being loved. And when people love you, they want to stay with you. Question is, what are you doing in your business (deliberately) to be loved? When your customers move from paying you to loving you, that’s what I call preserving future revenue. That way, with every sale you make, you make more into the future, only that the actual cash is deferred.

So what can you do? See these five steps:
http://africastartuplab.com/how-to-build-a-business-of-sticky-customers/?utm_campaign=twitter&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitter