6 Ways To Make Emotional Connections With Potential Customers

In a competitive market, you need to have strong relationships with potential customers before they make a purchase decision. And that’s difficult. Building and maintaining a relationship with existing customers happens naturally—but making connections with potential customers requires more effort.

1. ADDRESS THE RELATIONSHIP DEFICIT

Technology has made it easier for us to navigate through our busy lives, but it also erodes the fundamental element of human connections. When communicating digitally, often it can lack a human touch, which creates a sterile transaction and lack of emotional connection. Today, being forced into a virtual world is adding to these unintended consequences, which we call a relationship deficit.

As we’ve been forced to practice social distancing, people have realized how much they crave human connection. Not being able to dine with friends, see family members or interact with coworkers has put a strain on the human spirit. That is why the businesses that create emotional connections will dominate. 

2. AVOID EMPATHY FATIGUE

Empathy Fatigue usually occurs in industries that constantly deal with customers who have high emotional pain, like funeral homes, behavior therapy or oncology. However, with today’s world, every business is dealing with customers who have high stress and anxiety.

This can cause our employees to feel emotionally and physically drained which leads to a diminished ability to empathize or feel compassion for others. That is why as leaders we have to constantly be helping our employees reenergize, rejuvenate, feel appreciated, and understand the critical role they play in their customers’ lives. This not only results in the customer feeling better, but the employee will be less likely to burn out. 

3. MAKE YOUR CUSTOMERS FEEL SOMETHING

The #1 best customer service we can provide is being a positive escape with every person we come in contact with. You have to create an emotional connection that is so engaging and compelling that the customer literally ‘feels’ something after. 

“What drives today’s customers are emotions and feelings, some of which can’t be expressed in words and are triggered unconsciously. The most important element in customers choosing who they buy from is how a brand makes them feel. Companies like Apple don’t sell a product, they sell a brand that embodies a delicate mix of dreams and aspirations. That’s why Apple’s ads don’t show product features like memory, speed or device weight. The commercials are designed to provide sensory stimulation.”

So how do you create such an experience and train your employees to provide it? Examine every touchpoint in the customer journey to see if you have built in the feeling of ‘cared for’ in the journey.

4. FIND THE CONVERSATION GIFTS

It is all about finding the conversation Gift–there is a gift in every conversation. If you look for it, you will see it. By now most of you are familiar with FORD (family, occupation, recreation, and dreams) and probably have implemented it in your business.