Admit it.

You'd love to have an army of eager, passionate customers. The kind that tells anyone and everyone they meet about your business.

These customers are in love with your product or service.

They trust you implicitly, never haggling or complaining about price. They buy often, spending more money each time. They beg and fight for the opportunity to buy more of your products. These customers are known as "ideal customers."

Some of these customers are so devoted that they tattoo their favorite brands on their bodies.

These tattoos are a sign...

These things show that a really strong emotional bond has formed. But some “experts” tend to think otherwise. They believe these customer relationships are just made-up stories or wishful thinking.

They approach this topic with the wrong mindset.

In their world, you're lucky if you can find a customer who's willing to pay for your product or service.

Pretty bleak, isn't it?

This mindset comes across as needy and insecure. It's almost as if they don't believe their product is worth their asking price.

So, it's a good thing this isn't true. Besides, you're worth it, right? Of course, you are.

But do your customers know that?

Your customers know you're worth it when you...

Supply them with the right ingredients. See, customers are selfish.

• "What's in it for me?"

• "What have you done for me lately?"

• "How does this fix my problems?"

They're selfish because they must be.

Buying is dangerous. Customers are conditioned to be cautious and skeptical. They can be cheated out of their hard-earned money, used and abused, or neglected. It can be as simple as buying the wrong product.

Selfishness keeps them safe.

Most customers start the relationship here. They come to you with a problem or something they want from you. If they feel you're trustworthy, then and only then do they decide to give you money.

Most customer relationships stay here.

Relationships Without "Connection" Are Selfish

When it comes to customer relationships, there are two kinds:

1.  Dedicated. I want to stay in this relationship.

2.  Constrained. I have to stay in this relationship.

Dedicated Relationships: I want to stay

These relationships create emotional bonds that are deeply satisfying. They develop naturally when the right emotional incentives are in place. It's no surprise then, that loyalty flows naturally from these relationships.

Which factors are most important?

1. Admiration: This means customers admire what you stand for, who you are, or what you do. How do you cultivate admiration in someone else? You do admirable things - serving in ways that matter to your audience.

2. Benevolence: Customers see that you'll provide them with the care, guidance, and protection they need. You'll act in their best interests. 
   

3. Expertise: You're able to deliver the outcome or results you've promised, the way you promised. You deliver on time, at the price you  promised, going above and beyond to surprise and delight your customers.

4. Integrity: When the thoughts, feelings, words, and actions of your business align. This shows customers you can be trusted, giving them peace of mind and self-forgetfulness.

This is great and all, but things get dicey when it's time to apply all of this.

What does this look like?

• Dedicated example: Tough Mudder

A local, city-by-city endurance event where people run a 10-mile race through military-style obstacle courses. By the end of the race, participants are filthy, sweaty, and covered in mud.

More than 2.5 million people across the world have participated in Tough Mudder. They raise tens of thousands of dollars for the charities in their local communities, but it all started one community at a time.

Their "customers" are so passionate that not even the possibility of death can discourage them from participating. 

Could that maybe lead us to the next kind of relationship? 

The answer is YES!

Constrained Relationships: I have to stay

These relationships keep customers glued to your business, even when customers aren't emotionally bonded to your business. A constrained relationship has three main ingredients.

1.  A desire to be in control: Customers want to maintain the status quo. Doing that keeps them in control and free from pain.

2.  Loss aversion and regret avoidance: Customers feel intense psychological pain from losing things they value or experiencing regret. Naturally, these are powerful motivators.

3. Sunk costs: Customers are motivated to maintain the status quo if they've spent a considerable amount of time or money on your product or service. The greater the psychological  cost, the more likely customers are to stay.

Constrained relationships keep customers connected to your business, but they aren't enough to create an "enviable" relationship with customers.

You'll need to create…

• Constrained example: Planet Fitness

Planet Fitness is a local fitness center. They promote themselves as a "Judgment Free Zone," catering to new and casual gym users.

They aren't without controversy.

A woman was asked to leave Planet Fitness because her toned body intimidated customers. Other customers weren't allowed to wear their religious head covering while working out.

Another customer was kicked out for... grunting.

And their customers love them for it. When it comes to protecting its customers, Planet Fitness takes its job seriously. That's earned them a lot of hate.

But their business continues to grow.

How?

Constrained relationships.

A quick look at their website shows you they offer things other fitness centers can't.

• Black card perks

• Unlimited training at any of their 1,000+ locations

• Free post-workout massages

• Free tanning beds

• Discounts on food, drinks, wearables, and even haircuts

Most personal trainers and one-off fitness centers can't offer these benefits. Even the YMCA can't compete with these benefits. Love them or hate them, you'll have to stick with Planet Fitness if you want these benefits.

Dedicated + Constrained example: Harley Davidson

At one point in its history, Harley-Davidson was facing bankruptcy. There was a real question of whether or not the company would survive.

Harley-Davidson relied on local communities to survive.

In 1983, Harley-Davidson established the Harley Owners Group (HOG) to build loyalty and cultivate a certain kind of lifestyle. HOG built itself up locally, chapter by chapter, bringing Harley-Davidson back from the brink of bankruptcy. It turned the brand into a lifestyle that customers are passionate about.

Harley-Davidson survives today because of the local HOG chapters that keep the business alive in their communities. Each chapter is filled with passionate customers, eager to spread the word about Harley-Davidson.

How do we know they're passionate? They show us.\

There are thousands of examples like these.

Today HOG has more than 1 million passionate members and 1400 chapters around the world. Each of these local chapters is active in its community. They sponsor events, offer exclusive products, and fund charity drives in their local communities all around the world.

Harley-Davidson customers stay because they want to. HOG members stay because they must; they can't get the exclusive benefits, camaraderie, and support of the community without their membership.

Which brings us to you.

How do you create this kind of relationship with your customers?

Great customer relationships begin with a moat

Warren Buffet popularized the idea of an economic moat. An economic moat makes it difficult for customers to leave and even more difficult for competitors to attack your business.

It shows customers they need you more than you need them.

But what do these moats look like?

• The brand moat. With the brand moat, customers are willing to pay more for your product or service because of what they get in return (e.g. prestige, reputation, quality, etc.).

• The secret moat. Intellectual property - copyrights, patents, trademarks, trade secrets - anything that fits into these categories makes it difficult for competitors to compete with you. Amazon's one click, Google's search algorithm, and KFC's secret recipe are all secrets.

• The toll moat. This means you have exclusive control over a market or niche. You're the only game in town so if customers want it, they'll have to come to you. Moz created the Mozscape Index, a list of all the sites their search engine has indexed. Competitors attempted to copy their secret sauce but only Moz has Mozscape.

• The switching moat. Businesses with a strong switching moat are tangled up in their customer's daily life. Google offers more than 250 products for free. Amazon continually adds free products and services to Amazon Prime. Customers fill these services with their data, making a separation incredibly difficult.

Did you catch the secret behind these moats?

It's ideas.

All these moats start with an idea. Once these ideas are implemented, they morph into something powerful.

They give you an opening.

The opening you need to create enviable customer relationships:

• Zappos created strong dedicated relationships with their 365-day return policy. Customers didn't have to stay, they chose to, and they saw that Zappos cared deeply about them and their happiness.

• Apple used both dedicated and constrained relationships. They used branding and advertising to create products customers would pee their pants to use, then they created a media ecosystem that requires iTunes, their proprietary software.

• Facebook uses constrained relationships to grow. When Google Plus was first announced, early adopters immediately left Facebook, vowing never to return. Their friends and family didn't follow. Eventually, these early adopters came crawling back. Because of this, most users will never leave.

• Hyundai used the Great Recession to create an army of dedicated loyalists with the Hyundai Assurance program. It went like this. Buy a Hyundai. If you lose your income in the next year, you can return the car; no hassle, no fuss.

That's the secret.

Enviable relationships start with an idea.

Legendary companies do it, and you can too. It's intimidating and risky, but these enviable relationships are available to anyone.

How Difficult is it to engage and retain customers?

Difficulty in engaging and retaining customers over the long term will make even the best of businesses go under.

Content is key for engaging customers and improving search engine visibility. Small businesses might struggle with consistently creating high-quality and relevant content. Consistency is much more important than frequency over the long term. 

Small, local businesses can't have these previous relationships

That's the fear at least.

The usual objection goes like this: There aren't that many local businesses using these strategies to develop relationships.

Here's why.

When businesses use these strategies well, they don't stay a "local" business for long. They become a regional, national, or international business.

How do I know?

Domino's Pizza. They originally catered to college students. Cheap food for hungry college students. Things went well at first. Then they built their business around a single idea.

30 minutes or it's free.

Their business exploded, growing from two stores in 1967 to 200 stores in 1978. All because of an idea.

Customers admitted the food was bad; in fact, so did executives. But their idea created a constrained relationship. The offer was too good for hungry college kids to pass up.  

So we will need to know about :

Customer Engagement: Developing Strong Relationships

Crafting Compelling Content: The Pillar of Engagement and Visibility

Content stands as the bridge that connects businesses with their audience, nurtures relationships, and elevates their online visibility. For small business owners, the challenge of consistently creating high-quality and relevant content can be like tending a fire that needs constant fuel. However, within this challenge lies the potential to captivate, educate, and forge lasting connections that resonate with both customers and search engines.

The Content Crucible

1. The Power of Connection: Imagine content as a thread that weaves through the digital landscape, stitching together businesses and their customers. Engaging, informative content nurtures a connection that goes beyond transactional interactions.

2. Visibility Elixir: Just as explorers marked paths to be found, content acts as a beacon that guides search engines. Quality content is the key to securing a higher ranking in search engine results, leading to increased visibility and organic traffic. 

Strategies for Consistent Content Creation

1. Content Calendar: Embrace the rhythm of consistency by creating a content calendar. This roadmap helps plan topics, distribution channels, and publishing schedules, ensuring a steady flow of content.

2. Diverse Formats: Content is not confined to written articles alone. Explore diverse formats such as videos, infographics, podcasts, and webinars to engage audiences with different preferences.

3. Repurposing: Like an artisan repurposing materials, transform existing content into different formats. An article can become a video, a webinar can be transcribed into a blog post, expanding its reach. All of those can also become social media posts to expand their reach further.

Elevating Engagement and Search Visibility

1. SEO Optimization: Infuse your content with relevant keywords and phrases that resonate with your target audience. This enhances your chances of being discovered by search engines and potential customers.

2. Educational Content: Offer value by addressing common questions, providing insights, and sharing knowledge relevant to your industry. This positions your business as a trusted resource.

3. Storytelling: Just as a captivating story captures hearts, weave storytelling into your content. Share your brand's journey, customer success stories, and industry insights through narratives that resonate. 

Overcoming the Challenges

1. Time Constraints: Create a content creation routine that suits your schedule. Consistency matters more than frequency, so focus on producing quality content regularly. Even if your content is no more than once per month, that will make an impact over time. 

2. Lack of Ideas: Seek inspiration from industry news, customer feedback, and trending topics. Collaborate with your team to brainstorm fresh ideas. One of the easiest ways to start is by making a list of questions that customers regularly ask. Those questions, and the answers, can easily become a list of topical ideas for content.

3. Lack of Tools: Use tools that can help you not only write content but also organize and distribute that content. With a platform like Kyrios, you can use the integrated AI to help write blog articles, social media posts, emails, and more. By using these tools for your email marketing, SEO, Social media, etc., you have the capacity to take one piece of well-written content and turn it into many content pieces shareable across multiple platforms.

Content creation isn't just a task; it's a channel to connect, educate, and elevate your business. Small business owners must recognize that content is a cornerstone of digital success—a powerful tool for engagement and search visibility.

By crafting a content strategy, embracing diverse formats, and optimizing for search engines, businesses can overcome the challenges of consistent content creation.

Through a commitment to delivering value, sharing stories, and staying attuned to audience needs, small businesses can not only engage customers but also stand out in the vast digital landscape, creating a unique identity that resonates and endures.

Then?

An army of eager, passionate customers is yours

You can develop enviable relationships with your customers, the kind where customers tell anyone and everyone they meet about your business.

The kind of customers who love your product or service.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if customers trusted you implicitly, never haggling or complaining about price? With the right idea, customers will beg and fight for the opportunity to work with you…

If you build the right relationship. Create the right idea and you'll have an army of eager, passionate customers - no haggling or complaining required.

So, Ready to Build Unbreakable Customer Relationships?

At Kyrios, we understand the challenges small businesses face in building lasting, meaningful connections with their customers. Developing those legendary relationships takes consistent, high-quality content and engagement that truly resonates. Our platform provides the tools and AI-driven solutions you need to craft compelling content that nurtures customer loyalty and drives business growth. From social media to email marketing and beyond, Kyrios helps you turn every interaction into an opportunity for connection.

Start building your customer army today! Learn more at https://kyriossystems.com/plans and discover how Kyrios can power your customer engagement strategies.