In small business, nothing is more important than great customer experience. Not even a solid sales strategy. In fact, one of the biggest mistakes a small business owner can make is to focus on sales over service.

Yes, it’s important to bring new clients into your business, but did you know that it is about ten times harder to attract a new client than it is to cross-sell to an existing client? If you have an already established customer base, organic growth is a more cost effective way to grow that bottom line.

And how do you convince your existing clients to spend more money with you? Simple. By delivering exceptional customer experience focused on quality, every time.

And the easiest way to do this? By ensuring your team has a foolproof, Nextgile BPA quality-driven system in place, such as Nextpond. This ‘top-down’ approach to quality customer experience is imperative to your company’s organic growth.

Need more convincing? Here are five reasons why you need to focus on customer experience over sales.

1. It builds trust

Loyalty is imperative in small business. These days there’s more competition than ever for clients, so it’s hard to attract a new client and easy to lose an existing one. A genuine focus on customer experience will increase trust and solidify your relationship, which could be the difference between client loyalty and clients who jump ship at the first sign of rough seas.

2. It’s far easier to cross-sell to an existing client than win a new one

As noted above, it can be ten times harder to win a new client than to cross-sell or up-sell your services or products to an existing client. With a genuine commitment to customer experience, your client base will feel valued and open to considering your other product and service offerings. Organic growth is one of the most simple and cost-effective growth strategies.

3. Happy clients = free marketing

We all know that happy clients are far more inclined to sing your praises to their friends and peers, and this can only lead to referrals. So, by ensuring a commitment to strong customer experience you’re not only keeping your clients engaged and loyal, but you’re sending free billboards out into the marketplace! Handy tip – always ask your clients for testimonials and to refer you on (make sure this is part of your marketing strategy). Because if you don’t ask you don’t get, and word of mouth is the most powerful marketing tool your business can employ.

4. Customer experience matters more than price

Studies have shown that a large percentage of clients, value service over price. This means that they will pay more for quality service which enables you to, in turn, to keep lifting quality. This can only help your bottom line in the long run as your clients will more easily accept price increases and new more expensive service offerings and products.

5. Trust = open communication

Customer experience builds loyalty and trust, as we’ve said above. When your relationship is strong, through the implementation of a quality-focused customer experience strategy, your clients know that they can voice any complaints and have issues handled properly. Honest feedback is essential for your growth.

It’s simple. By focusing on quality customer experience over sales with a strategy around organic growth, your business can only go from strength to strength.