Expanding your client base is vital to growing your business. Adding new clients isn’t always the first solution. In fact, your current clients may hold the key in your first steps toward promoting your growth.

Research the Market

An important step in expanding your base is to research the market and look for ways in which your current clients aren’t being served. You can interface with your clients via surveys, focus groups, interviews or observing them in your other interactions. What are their goals and how can you help them get there? Knowing your clients well enough to comprehend their pain points will show you where you can further meet their needs. The answer may be in better service or even in offering complementary products to help fill a gap.

Build Trust

Building trust helps to increase brand loyalty. One way to increase trust is to be more transparent when problems arise. It may sound counterintuitive, but it’s essential to be honest about issues your customers are having and what you’re doing to resolve them. My Absolute Beauty advises that by taking more responsibility for your outcomes, you’ll find that your clients will trust you more.

Another way to increase transparency is to have a blog rather than just a website full of products or services. Think of your blog as a conversation with your best customer. You can give your customers a glimpse behind the curtain without giving away all your trade secrets.

For example, try sharing news relevant to your industry and highlight the ways in which your product or service makes a difference in people’s lives. Customers also like to see behind-the-scenes “exclusives” and answers to frequently asked questions.

Communicate Consistently

According to One Call Now, one key to trust is consistent communication. Whether they do it via phone, email, social media or comments on your blog posts, when they reach out to your company, customers need to feel as though someone on the other end is listening. Not only do you need to reply, but your brand voice needs to be consistent across all forms of communication. This means your employees must be solid on what your brand voice is and how issues should be addressed.

So, in order to expand your client base, you need to talk with your customers to learn how you can better address their needs and build trust. Reassure them that you’re listening – especially when problems arise.

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