Attract More Music Students
The customer journey takes a turn for the better at the point of sale. Perhaps you’ve made an impression with your social media and your website. These impressions and feelings prepared your customer for the big moment; the sale. In this episode we’ll explore how you can attract more music students in your studio for longer.
Author Shep Hyken maps out the different stages of the customer journey. In his customer experience classic “Cult of The Customer”. He refers to these stages as “cultures”.
The initial stage is called the culture of uncertainty. The next stage would be a culture of alignment and the last stage is the culture of amazement. Now I’m totally going off memory here as to what these different cultures are called but I think this covers the general idea.
Amaze Your Music Students
The culture of amazement is where customers become a brand evangelist. A brand evangelist is someone who wants to spread the word about your studio because you’ve added value to their life. If your internal marketing or customer-based marketing efforts have been effective, your well-informed customers understand what is special and what is unique about your music studio. They’re well informed because you have made it a point to educate them on what it is that you believe-what hope and outcome you have for their child.
These types of customers want to tell their friends about you. It feels good to be a brand evangelist of any product. Doesn’t if feel good to refer your favorite restaurant to a friend? You’ll be their hero if they love the restaurant too. They’ll think of you every time they dine there. You’ll become a high value source for referrals.
If you make a good recommendation to your friend, that friend is likely to reach out to you again when they need another referral. You’ll be glad to help.
The culture of alignment or connection begins to form after the customer has had a few lessons, they know what to expect, they begin to understand how your studio operates, what your studio believes in. Alignment begins when the customer sees results and begins to form positive feelings about your business based on the experience they’ve had.
Why Businesses Fail
Getting customers to this culture of alignment and connection as quickly as possible is crucial. There are things you can do to get your customer to this point sooner rather than later. If a customer wallows in uncertainty for too long, well this is where trouble sets in. this is when dropouts occur. Shep Hyken points out that too many business function in this culture of uncertainty. Too many businesses fail for this very reason.
The culture of connection and consistency begins the steady climb to the culture of trust and ultimately amazement.
The secret to getting your customers on the right foot and moving in the right direction towards alignment is the telephone. Yes one of the oldest tools in your marketing tool kit is often the most effective. The telephone. No other marketing or communication tool creates a personal connection like the telephone.
Attract More Music Students
If a website visitor clicks your start today button and schedules their first lesson with you and the whole transaction is a digital transaction, it fails to be an emotional transaction. That’s fine, but now the customer is deep in the culture of uncertainty. Los Rios Rock School offsets this by scheduling or inviting new inquires in for a tour. A very mapped-out tour with specific talking points. The purpose of this tour is to appeal to the customer’s senses as they step into the space full of music of kids.
Not everyone can do a Los Rios style onboarding process so the telephone can come in and make that happen. The telephone creates an opportunity to have a conversation with a customer in a fashion that you’ll most likely never have again with them. Your future conversations with the parent will be about scheduling and billing-the more mundane stuff.
Your Customers Hopes and Dreams
That initial phone call allows you to ask the customer what is that they want for their child? Why are they seeking out music lessons? What hopes and dreams do they have for their child?
Their answers to your questions will allow you to metaphorically sit on your customers side of the table and put your arm around them and make them feel like you understand them. You can tailor design your sales pitch to their specific needs. An introverted child who doesn’t like sports or other activities has different needs than an extroverted child who loves sports. Their needs are different but the solution is the same.
The telephone allows you to make an initial strong first impression and connection. You can increase the customer’s excitement and understanding of your service in a way that you can’t in the digital domain. The telephone allows you to make it personal. It allows your customer to feel like they’ve been heard, that they’re special and that you genuinely care about them and that you understand them, and that you are there to help them. The telephone allows you to set the stage for the journey the customer’s child is about to embark on. That initial phone conversation sets the stage for the customer journey.
SHOW CREDITS
Intro music: Dusted by Fojimoto
Transition music: Levi Simon
Outro music: Rain and Revolution by City Breathing
