What's up guys on this video I'm really Excited to share some key strategies That will help you reduce your client Churn and improve your client retention Rates this is something I call the Client retention maximization model and This is born out of years and years and Years in our agency trying to figure out How to improve our retention rates Um and working with hundreds of agencies Across the country If you're struggling with clients Canceling clients calling in to pause Feeling like you did a great job for Clients and them still saying hey you Know what we're going in a different Direction this Canon will be a game Changer for you so be sure to listen up This is going to be lots of fun so this Is what I call the client retention Model and really it all starts with your Onboarding right the way that you come Out of the gates with your client when They sign up will this determine whether They're with you a year down the road Believe it or not what happens in the First 24 hours what happens in the first Seven days sets the pace for the entire Business relationship we found is when We moved from here's a username and Password form that you can fill in to Really crafting a world-class onboarding Experience everything changed from a Retention perspective so what does it
Take in order to improve your client Retention and to to Really create that World-class onboarding experience I'll Be talking about that in just a second The second thing that you really want to Focus on to improve client retention is Your effective communication flow right When a client signs up if you want a Retainer-based service right they're Giving you the credit card they give you The ACH form they've started the Relationship what they want to know is How much am I spending what's my return On investment am I getting value and if You don't have a great communication Process in place you're going to lose Clients in our agency we've kind of been Through the gamut with this plumbing and HVAC SEO me and my business partner Dean We started out doing websites doing SEO Thinking we were really good at what we Did and actually getting the clients Ranked getting them tons and tons of Calls showing the tangible measurable Return on investment but six months in Month nine months in they send us an Email hey we've decided to go a Different direction hey we're canceling And we're like man what's going on and It was because we kind of took the Approach of no news is good news right They haven't written to us we haven't Had to meet with them that's a great Thing let's just hope that nothing goes
Wrong and you don't want to run your Business in that way right if you can be More proactive if you can have a really Great client communication process Mapped in advance it can make a big Difference in your retention rate now The Third pillar of client retention Especially as you grow and scale your Agency is having a client success Management methodology right which is Really thinking about when we when we Grow and when we start to take on more And more clients recognize that you Won't personally be able to handle those Client relationships right if you get to 17 18 19 clients kind of that's where You start to break as an agency owner Maybe you can handle it to that level But you have to at that stage in the Game decide am I going to continue to Handle these clients and stop growing or Do I put somebody in place to handle the Client relationships so I can continue To focus on the growth in the business Development in the business and so if You don't have a strategic approach to Hire account managers train them up and Get them deployed into your business You'll be stuck and so you really want To have great client success management Methodologies built into your business And so what want to do now is I want to Unpack each of these three with you give You some very practical and specific
Insights but if you're getting value From this video what I want you to do is Press the like button press the Subscribe button share this with another Agency you know that would benefit from It because I really think you're going To get some great insights from this Video so World-class onboarding the first thing We want to do to really create a World-class onboarding experience is to Kick off with the bang and appreciation So for us that means a personal touch Like an actual personal message hey Thanks so much for your business we're Really excited about working with you It's going to be great it also entails Like really thinking about how we Capture the usernames the passwords the Details we need to run their campaign The quicker we can get that information From them and the more seamless we can Make that process the more confident the Client's going to be that they're in the Right place and the quicker you'll be Able to get out of the gates and Actually start to deliver some results For them Appreciation is probably one of the most Overlooked aspects of running an agency And getting agency clients oftentimes we Get the credit card we go to work and That's it maybe we send an email that Says thanks what we found is if you can
Drop Stuff in the mail a welcome basket like A a goodie basket that says hey thanks So much for your business we're excited About working with you that will stand Out it will really go a long ways in Terms of the experience that you create For your clients so think about every Time a client signs up sending them Something in the mail sending them some Shari's Berries or or a goodie basket Like that this way you're going to Really come out of the gates in a Professional and impactful way Second of that we want to make this the Collection of data seamless usernames God you know your domain access what's Their USP a lot of times we make it Harder for the client than it needs to Be we give them 112 question Questionnaire we email it off and we're Like hey get that over to us and let's See let's see how it goes right I don't Know about you and our agency what we Found was they would go radio silent Like this somebody would fill out five Or six of the questions and our team Will be standing by and they would be Frustrated because they didn't have all The answers we'd be frustrated because We really couldn't Implement and two Three four six weeks pass and we still Haven't launched the campaign what you Need to do is engineer a process that
Helps to collect that information that Really gets on their side of the table And says hey where are you stuck what Information do you not have and actually Help them track that information down You need to be quick out of the gates And you need to make it super simple so That you can gather the usernames and Passwords number three as it relates to Crafting a world-class onboarding Experience is you need to engineer quick Wins One of the biggest Reasons a client is going to churn is if They give you the credit card they give You the information And a couple weeks a couple months go by And they're still not seeing any leads They're still not seeing any sales right And in our agency plumbing and HVAC SEO We started an SEO agency which meant we Would build a website we would do the SEO work we would try and get it ranked Over time sometimes it would take three Six months before they started to see The results of that and of course that Impacts your retention rates and so you Want to be strategic with well what can We do in week one that will generate a Tangible result some of the quick wins That we found work really well is Launching a pay-per-click campaign in The first week you don't have to have The website done you can set up some
Landing pages you can turn on a campaign You can make it very specific maybe to The higher transaction value services so That they they don't need to see a Return on investment in the first week But if they can see a lead if they could See an opportunity in addition to your Other communication they're going to Feel much better another one of my Really really favorite Um quick win strategies is database Reactivation right all of our clients That we work with in your agency in ours They have past customers they have past Prospects they have unconverted Opportunities in their Pipeline and 99 Of the time they don't do anything with That past database it's one of the Easiest things you can do to show a Tangible measurable result right out of The gates is get their past customers Contact details the emails and the phone Numbers send them an offer do something That could take some of those people That were interested To actually do something do something to Get the past customers to buy again and You can generate tangible measurable Results almost immediately for your Client base so as it relates to World-class onboarding what can you Implement what can you do here can you Make your onboarding simpler can you Maybe drop a welcome basket into the
Mail right after they sign up what Specific things can you do to generate Quick wins for your clients would love To hear some of those from you guys in The comments now the next piece is Effective communication which is the Client's out of launch they're paying us On a monthly basis we want them to stay Right this is all about reducing our Turn and increasing our attention in Order to do that you have to have a Communication Rhythm that makes sense to The client and you need to have Strategic reporting which is what do you Show the client what do you report back To the client so that they understand The value that you bring to the table so That they're seeing look I'm spending Whatever I'm spending 2500 bucks a month Plus five grand and spend Is that worth my investment is it worth The time and the energy that I'm Spending what I found is with your Strategic reporting what you want to do Is a lot of times reduce the amount of Information that you share right for our Agency we used to share Google analytics We used to share a ranking report that Showed where they ranked on Google and Yahoo on Bing in a lot of different Keywords we would show them these Activity reports of all the things that We were doing for them and they'd be Like
I don't know like too much data or they Would focus in on the wrong thing what We found was by moving to strategic Reporting which is what the client Really cares about is how much did I Spend How many leads did I generate What's my average cost per lead and What's my return on investment if you Can boil the reporting that you share Back to your clients so those key Details it has a huge impact on their Ability to quickly feel like man I'm Getting great results here and I don't Need to focus on this further the next Is we want to have a really good meeting Rhythm Don't assume that your client's going to Pay you a retainer-based service 1500 2500 5 000 per month And not hear from you or just rely on Automatic communication or automatic Reports what we found is moving to a Consistent meeting Rhythm where every Month we're going to meet with the Client we've got a specific agenda where The specific things we're going to cover There's specific things we're going to Ask them to do at Homework we're going To report back wins and we're going to Tell them what's coming up next that Consistent communication rhythm is Expected and when you do it and you do It well it will absolutely improve your
Client retention rates and the third Thing is it relates to your Communication rhythm is you have to Constantly be seating the vision right The number one reason a client's going To leave is perceived indifference and If you do this right you meet with them You show the value they're going to know You care they're going to know you're There and your team is doing a good job The other reason that they leave is Because there's tons of competition in The agency game your client is getting Emailed called solicited on a daily Basis from other people gen generating That are promising they can generate Better results or they've got some new Secret Sauce that's going to help them Take their business to the next level And so If they don't feel like you're on The Cutting Edge you're thinking about What's next you're resting on your Laurels if they don't feel like you've Got some next thing that you're focused On for them they're absolutely going to Go somewhere else so you have to train Your team to constantly be seating the Vision hey here's what we did here's What we're seeing in terms of results And here's where we're going next here's The plan for the next 60 to 90 days Right and so for your client Communication as you think about that
What are some things you need to improve Maybe you need to dial back the Reporting or get more specific maybe you Just need to get better at seeing the Vision and kind of rolling out new Things and new strategies that are going To help them move things forward and Generate the results that they're Expecting now the third critical Component of really maximizing your Client retention is client success Management like I said before as you Grow as you scale the first thing you Need to remove yourself from is Operations right to actually build a Seven figure and multiple seven-figure Agency you can't be the one building the Website writing the content or even Project managing the work that's the First thing the second thing you have to Remove yourself from is account Management because talking to the Clients seating the vision managing this Client or communication process takes Time it takes energy so you have to Quickly get good at placing account Managers in your business that can Handle that for you and free you up to Focus on the growth and the business Number one as it relates to client Success management is you have to track Your attention and your churn right here We are in a video talking about how to Reduce churn and improve client
Retention rates most agencies I talk With don't have a good pulse on what Their retention rate is and I know for a Fact that what you measure gets done What you track always improves and so be Sure that you've got a mechanism in Place where you're tracking your Retention rates month over month quarter Over quarter year over a year and we've Got a great tracking mechanism we can Share with you called our sales and Retention tracking sheet that will help You know exactly what your client Retention rate is in a given month the Next thing is you need to know your kpis Your key performance indicators right if All you're looking at is churn that's a Lagging indicator oh we lost five Clients this month we lost two clients This month we lost four clients this Month What you really want to pay attention to Is what are the kpis what are the key Performance indicators that are going to Dictate that the retention is going to Improve and so some of the kpis you want To track is what percentage of your Clients are actually meeting with you on A monthly basis what percentage of your Clients are getting a tangible Measurable return on investment what Percentage of your clients are engaged In the process and you want to you want To have baked into your your team
Meetings and your communication process With your internal account management Staff those kpis being tracked and Reported on a consistent basis and then The last piece I really want to suggest That you put in place for your client Success management process is a traffic Light system you know if you've got a Hundred clients let's just say it's very Hard to keep a pulse on which clients Are happy which clients are frustrated Which clients have one foot out the door And usually we've got these these Clients listed let's say in a CRM Somewhere like high level or Salesforce Or HubSpot or one of these different Platforms or we've got them sitting on An sell sheet and so it's really hard You just got a list of clients with Their contact details and maybe a bunch Of notes in your project management System what we found really works well Is to traffic light your clients which Just means you have all your clients and They're in one of three states they're Red which means they're upset Something's not going well they're Yellow which means and you know they're They're potentially not super happy Maybe there's an issue that needs to be Addressed in green green they're happy They're getting results they're really Satisfied they're going to be an Advocate for our services if you can put
A process in place where you can really Clearly and Visually see which of our Clients are in each of those three States you can much better manage For the clients that are yellow and red And figure out how do we move those Clients back to green like is it a Results thing is it communication thing Is it something else that we can do to Move those clients back to green and When you've got a great client success Management process like that you're Going to improve your retention you're Going to free yourself up and you're Going to be able to focus on what you do Best or taking more personal time and Doing the things that you really want to Do so this is the client retention model We talked about world-class onboarding Effective communication and client Success management I hope you got great Value from this we'd love to hear in Your comments what are your insights What are your takeaways what will you Implement and if you'd like to go deeper With this I've got a great client Retention workbook that gives you this Checklist gives you some specific steps And some specific actions that you can Take you can access that by going to Sevenfigure agency.com retention Workbook And if you haven't already be sure to Grab a copy of my book The Client
Retention roadmap for digital marketing Agencies which really walks you through Exactly what you need to do to improve Your client retention rates so thanks For watching let me know in the comments If if you got some value and you got Some takeaways be sure to hit the like Button be sure to hit the Subscribe Button and share this with another Agency that could benefit talk to you Soon
