Turn Your First Time Customers into Life time Customers
Good morning! I hope 2007 has been a successful year for you so far. It'll be spring soon with lots of opportunities to sell your handmade jewelry via craft and jewelry shows. Plus, Valentine's Day will be upon us before you know it. Time to start marketing your handmade jewelry as Valentine gifts. (we'll have a posting about that soon). By the way, hearts are going to be a very strong motif this year in jewelry, in general, and will still be a strong trend even after Valentine's Day.
I wanted to let you know about a little technique that can help you turn a first time craft show customer into a life time one. You may already be doing this, but if you're not, it's important that you start. As you already know it costs much more time and energy to gain a new customer than it does to retain an existing one. Your existing customer has already shown that she loves your handmade jewelry by purchasing it. She can be your customer for life if you know how to follow up with her.
Here's a suggestion and a plan you can follow to gain that life time customer:
1. Get a pretty, rather large decorative, blank book from a craft store that fits with the theme of your jewelry display. I suggest a decorative book because you want to have attention to detail. No cheap drugstore notebooks allowed. (You wouldn't do that anyway, just need to be sure). You want the pages within to be lined.
2. On craft show day, take this book with you and place it by your checkout area.
3. When a customer checks out after purchasing a piece of handmade jewelry from you, ask them to leave their email address so you can keep them informed of any special promotions in the future. After the customer has signed the book, you may want to make a quick note beside the entry as to what type of item they purchased.
4. After returning home from the show, type up a short email similar to the one below:
Dear ________ (this can be personalized using an autoresponder that fills in the name)
I am pleased to have met you at the craft show yesterday. Thank you so much for your purchase! I hope you'll enjoy wearing your new jewelry creation by ________ (name of company or artist). Your jewelry was carefully handcrafted with extra care and attention to detail to give you a piece that should last a lifetime. I derive great pleasure from making jewelry for nice customers like you! If you should ever need a matching piece to go with your purchase, please let me know. I do custom orders and will be happy to fulfill your request, if possible. Please keep me in mind the next time you need a gift or a custom design for a special person. With your permission, I'll keep you on my mailing list and will inform you of any special offers. Thank you again for your purchase! It's much appreciated. :-)
__________ (Your Name)
__________ (Company Name)
__________ (Website address)
5. I would use an autoresponder to send this message out to your list after every show. The autoresponder will automatically fill in the name of the recipient and can even personalize the email based on what item the person bought if you set it up that way. You can also set it to do automatic mailings and updates to your customer list based on your needs. It's a huge time saver. I've tried alot of autoresponders and the best I've found is this one. Their customer service is absolutely second to none!
6. I would do periodic mailings to my list to inform your customers of new offerings, special promotions etc. I would also do a mailing around gift giving seasons such as Valentine's Day and Christmas. Just don't take it overboard and offend your customer with too many mailings. It's important to remind your customers every once in a while that you're still out there. Believe it or not, they really appreciate it from the feedback I've received.
By doing the above, your customer list will grow and grow and grow along with your handmade jewelry sales. Plus, your sales should increase with less effort on your part. As they say in the mail order business, your customer list is like gold!
I hope you have a happy and productive afternoon. Talk to you soon. :-)
Kristie
Good morning! I hope 2007 has been a successful year for you so far. It'll be spring soon with lots of opportunities to sell your handmade jewelry via craft and jewelry shows. Plus, Valentine's Day will be upon us before you know it. Time to start marketing your handmade jewelry as Valentine gifts. (we'll have a posting about that soon). By the way, hearts are going to be a very strong motif this year in jewelry, in general, and will still be a strong trend even after Valentine's Day.
I wanted to let you know about a little technique that can help you turn a first time craft show customer into a life time one. You may already be doing this, but if you're not, it's important that you start. As you already know it costs much more time and energy to gain a new customer than it does to retain an existing one. Your existing customer has already shown that she loves your handmade jewelry by purchasing it. She can be your customer for life if you know how to follow up with her.
Here's a suggestion and a plan you can follow to gain that life time customer:
1. Get a pretty, rather large decorative, blank book from a craft store that fits with the theme of your jewelry display. I suggest a decorative book because you want to have attention to detail. No cheap drugstore notebooks allowed. (You wouldn't do that anyway, just need to be sure). You want the pages within to be lined.
2. On craft show day, take this book with you and place it by your checkout area.
3. When a customer checks out after purchasing a piece of handmade jewelry from you, ask them to leave their email address so you can keep them informed of any special promotions in the future. After the customer has signed the book, you may want to make a quick note beside the entry as to what type of item they purchased.
4. After returning home from the show, type up a short email similar to the one below:
Dear ________ (this can be personalized using an autoresponder that fills in the name)
I am pleased to have met you at the craft show yesterday. Thank you so much for your purchase! I hope you'll enjoy wearing your new jewelry creation by ________ (name of company or artist). Your jewelry was carefully handcrafted with extra care and attention to detail to give you a piece that should last a lifetime. I derive great pleasure from making jewelry for nice customers like you! If you should ever need a matching piece to go with your purchase, please let me know. I do custom orders and will be happy to fulfill your request, if possible. Please keep me in mind the next time you need a gift or a custom design for a special person. With your permission, I'll keep you on my mailing list and will inform you of any special offers. Thank you again for your purchase! It's much appreciated. :-)
__________ (Your Name)
__________ (Company Name)
__________ (Website address)
5. I would use an autoresponder to send this message out to your list after every show. The autoresponder will automatically fill in the name of the recipient and can even personalize the email based on what item the person bought if you set it up that way. You can also set it to do automatic mailings and updates to your customer list based on your needs. It's a huge time saver. I've tried alot of autoresponders and the best I've found is this one. Their customer service is absolutely second to none!
6. I would do periodic mailings to my list to inform your customers of new offerings, special promotions etc. I would also do a mailing around gift giving seasons such as Valentine's Day and Christmas. Just don't take it overboard and offend your customer with too many mailings. It's important to remind your customers every once in a while that you're still out there. Believe it or not, they really appreciate it from the feedback I've received.
By doing the above, your customer list will grow and grow and grow along with your handmade jewelry sales. Plus, your sales should increase with less effort on your part. As they say in the mail order business, your customer list is like gold!
I hope you have a happy and productive afternoon. Talk to you soon. :-)
Kristie
posted by Your friends at Beads Indeed | 3:40 AM
1 Comments:
Hi Bistre Maven! Thanks for your nice comment. I really appreciate it! There are alot of jewelers out there but as long as we seek out our own niche, there's room for all of us. Nice to meet someone from Virginia Beach! We used to visit there quite often. Looking forward to the warm weather so we can head back in that direction. Thanks again for contributing. :-)
Kristie
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