When clients leave, it feels like a disaster. But it’s not a judgement on you. It just means that right now, your offers aren’t lining up with the person’s needs. If you practice skillful relationship-based client service, this can be an opportunity to connect with the person and bring them back on board. Here are six proven strategies for winning back lost clients. 

Make an Enticing Offer

Send an email with an interesting offer or incentive for the person to come back. This could be a discount on your products, free exclusive content, a freebie, membership to a website, or anything else that’s highly valuable to your audience. 

Offer Free Educational Opportunities

Clients might be leaving because they’ve bought your product and don’t know how to use it. You can win them back by offering educational opportunities where you teach them how to get the most out of your product. 

This can be done through content or, even better, webinars and training sessions. Engage with your clients personally and actually show them one-on-one or in groups how to maximize their purchase. 

Show How You’ve Grown

Send former clients content that underlines the changes you’ve made to give them a better experience. Highlight new products or systems, and show how these make life better for your audience. Examples could include things like a new client service center, one-touch ordering, or fixes to products based on client feedback. 

Run a Social Media Competition

You can bring people back with a social media competition that gets them directly involved in making improvements to your services. For example, run a campaign that invites clients to tell you what they’d like to see changed. Another idea is to give your clients a chance to suggest new products they’d like to see you develop. 

Find Out Why

When a client is thinking about leaving, contact them to see if they wouldn’t mind taking a short exit survey. Find out why they’re leaving and use this to improve your future marketing and products. It’s also an opportunity for you to make contact and remind the person of the benefits you offer, or make a special offer to get them back. 

Recommend a Competitor

This might sound counterintuitive, but it’s a way of playing the long game. If you’re not fulfilling your client’s needs, help them get those needs fulfilled somewhere else. Recommend them to a competitor or point them to resources they need. Sure, they’re leaving you, but they’re leaving you on good terms. The goodwill you create will help your brand and they’re more likely to return in the future. 

If you manage it well, you can bring clients back and win them over so that they’re even more loyal than before.

If you want to know about more ways to retain client long-term, then head over to my program, Clients for Life, where you’ll find a wealth of strategies to help you succeed.