Client Retention Best Practices

Marina de la Torre

Senior Director, Customer Success

A MINDBODY University Sneak Peek

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Marketing is great, but if you cannot keep your clients coming back,

then those dollars are wasted.

Customer retention is less expensive and requires less time and effort

than bringing in new clients.

Client Retention

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The Cost of Attrition

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10% The average year-over-year

retention for a class-based

business/service

A good goal is 50%

40% The average year-over-year retention

for appointment-based

business/service

A good goal is 90%

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Reporting

First Impressions

Connection

Motivation

Client Feedback Loop

The Cost of Attrition

Reporting

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Your staff play an important role when it comes to retention and you are

only as strong as your weakest link.

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Staff Bonus Based On Retention

Quantify your expectations:

• Desk staff will sell 5 Autopays per week

• Instructors will maintain retention rates for new clients of 50%

or higher

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Understanding Attendance and Retention

Big classes can hide poor retention.

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Setting Retention Goals: Retention Report

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Setting Retention Goals: Staff Bonus

Set an achievable goal to increase new clients retained:

273 x 46% = 126 new clients

273 x 51% = 139 new clients

13 more new clients per 5% increase

13 x drop-in ($20) x avg visits per month (4)

$1,040 per month

$6,240 per 6 months

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Clients Lapsing (and How To Win Them Back!)

Motivate and be proactive about it:

• Have a retention plan and staff person who implements retention strategies

• Reach out before they expire

• Keep them motivated and coming back

• Call them—reschedule them

• They want to hear from you!

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• Send a “we want you back” message, include a promo code (use

Promotions in software)

• Easily export report directly to excel to get email addresses

• You can also use this with Autopays to catch people before they cancel

Clients Lapsing (and How To Win Them Back!)

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Examples of “We Miss You” Email

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MINDBODY Accelerate

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Example of Accelerate “We Miss You” Email

First Impressions

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20 seconds

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First Impressions: New Clients

It’s essential to make great first impressions in all areas you interact

with clients.

• Physical space

• Staff

• Website

• Collateral

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First Impressions: New Clients • The physical space of your business

should reflect your style, values, and

vision

• It must be clean, welcoming, and

comfortable

• Although often unaware, clients are

deeply influenced by their surroundings

and may choose your competitor

because it is more physically appealing

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Making It Easy: Signing and Paying

Connection

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- Brene Brown

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Orient and Help New Clients

• New client workshops / orientation / “Getting Started”

• Greet them by name

• Welcome packages

• Call them afterward (Advisor)

• Specific classes/sessions geared toward new

clients

• Selling them something else (Sales Person) increases retention from 20% to 40%

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Education for Clients

• Newsletters: give the “why” and educate your clients

• Staff experts

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Shower Clients With Attention and Love

• At the end of the day, how you treat your clients on a day-to-day basis

will determine whether they come back or not

• It isn’t the smartest, most talented

teacher/trainer/instructors that are

most successful—it’s the ones who

have the best people skills

• Same goes for businesses

Motivation

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Tactics to Motivate and Engage Clients

GROUP PROGRAMS CHALLENGES CERTIFICATIONS

Your clients don’t necessarily see or feel their improvement, so you need

to highlight it for them.

Measure, take pictures, have written assessments, range of motion, SOAP notes, etc.

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Examples

Client Feedback

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What Does Your Client Want?

“The problem with most failing businesses I’ve encountered is not that their

owners don’t know enough about Finance, Marketing Management, and

Operations—they don’t, but those things are easy enough to learn—but they

spend their time and energy defending what they think they know. The greatest

business people I’ve met are determined to get it right, no matter what the

cost.”

– The E-Myth Revisited, by Michael E. Gerber

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Customer Feedback

Proactive Approach

• The business makes the first

move to help customers

• Listen to customers and

continuously solicit their feedback

Reactive Approach

• The business reacts to

customers’ problems

• Manage customer complaints

Provide an experience that meets customer expectations and produces

satisfied customers.

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The Value of Complaints

Customers who have a problem with a product or service voice their

objection to the company directly (only) 50% of the time.

9 out of 10 of these customers usually take their future business

elsewhere.

A complaining customer gives you the

opportunity to turn them around and make

them a happy customer—consider it a gift.

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Staff Training to Diffuse Complaints

• Let clients vent, even if it is irrational

• Acknowledge the client’s feelings

• Offer solutions – fix the problem and/or offer incentive

• Evaluate client lifetime value

• Is it worth losing a customer over $100, when their lifetime contribution to your

business might be $5,000?

• Turn it around – make them a customer for life!

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Listen to Customers

APP

REVIEWS SUGGESTION

BOX

WEBSITE

FEEDBACK LISTEN 360 SURVEYS

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Understand What Your Clients Want

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Having a Retention Strategy and Plan in Place

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Reporting

First Impressions

Connection

Motivation

Client Feedback

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