‘Surprise and Delight’ has become an essential part of any serious marketer’s plan for better conversions and retention. Some marketers are touting surprise and delight as THE number one factor for increased retention. At DCPG, we are big fans of surprising and delighting. In fact, ‘’to over deliver and surprise’’ is one of our company core values.
To surprise and delight your customers is to exceed their expectations, improving their experience with ‘spontaneous’ offers of value and kindness. When we speak about surprise and delight, we are not talking about front end offers or pre-disclosed membership rewards. We are talking about added bonuses which where not included in the original offering. This approach is designed to promote customer loyalty and engagement, to reduce churn and increase profitability as a result.
In addition to the retention benefit, surprising your customers can also play a huge part in referrals. A recent study caried out by LoyaltyOne assessed the responses customers had to surprise and delight campaigns. Here are the results:
- 90% of respondents claimed to have an elevated positive perception of the brand
- 50% of respondents told peers about their experience
- 33% of respondents gave the brand more business as a direct result of the surprise and delight gesture.
Surprise and Delight leads to increased customer loyalty, which means higher PVA’s, more treatment plan sales, higher LTV’s, more referrals, more positive reviews, and less drop offs. It can be used as a tool to reactivate your old customers, make your current customer visit you more often and turn your very best clients into brand advocates that promote your business on your behalf (The walking, talking testimonial!).
How can you use surprise and delight in your practice?
Here are some ways you can implement surprise and delight in your practice:
Random acts of kindness – The most effective way to surprise and delight is through random acts of kindness. This can be as simple as upping your service level in practice, so your staff are constantly on the lookout for opportunities to help, delight and surprise your clients (Think opening the door for patients as they leave, offering them a drink or helping them with their bags). Alternatively, you can take a more structured approach to your ‘random acts of kindness’. Coffee shop chain ‘Pret’ do a fantastic job of this. Each shop is allocated a budget to gift drinks and snacks for free throughout the day. In student cities, Pret employees have been encouraged to target students with these ‘not so random’ acts of kindness. The thought process being that students will not only appreciate it more than your average shopper but are also potential lifetime customers. Coffee shop customers tend to be fiercely loyal, so if you can gain their favour early, the likelihood is they will stick with you for the long run (not unlike healthcare customers!). If you see a lot of ‘pay as you go’ visits, can you put together a small budget to randomly gift appointments for free to customers who have the potential to use your services for a long time?
Milestone gifts – More akin to random acts of kindness, milestone gifts are arguably the best surprise and delight strategy we can implement in our practices. The lifetime value of a Chiropractic patient is high and, overall, profit margins in the profession are very high. That should leave us with a healthy budget to spend on spoiling our very best clients. Remember, the chances are your clinic follows Pareto principle meaning 80% of your revenue comes from the top 20% of your clients (or close to). Therefore, it is imperative to look after and nurture that top 20%. Setting up a gifting structure where clients receive gifts upon hitting certain spend milestones will go a long way to winning their continued custom and to turning them into walking talking testimonials. It is best if the gift appears to come from the blue, so do not make the customer aware that they are receiving this gift because they have spent ‘x’ amount at your practice. Simply thank them for their continued support and for being such a great client. Common gifts that we use are flowers and hampers, but the more customised these gifts can be, the more impact they will have. Make sure to speak and listen to your clients. Get a gauge of their likes, dislikes, hobbies, and interests (Even create a client preference spreadsheet to keep track, so you don’t forget!). When it comes time to gift, select something specific to these preferences (or something related to current events in their lives). Ryan’s brother Dean who is an associate, bought one of his best clients a £250 wetsuit for an upcoming iron man triathlon Dean had been helping him prepare for! Safe to say, that client still comes in to see Dean every week! Remember, do not be cheap with these gifts! If a client has spent £2000 with you, then a £100 hamper is the least you can do, especially when they will likely go on to spend another £2000 with you after receiving such a thoughtful gift.
Life Event gifts – Similar to milestone gifts, life event gifts require you to listen and understand what is going on in your client’s life. When done correctly this can surprise and delight, but also show empathy, which is an extremely powerful connection building tool. Life events can be positive, such as Graduations, engagements, or a new-born. But can also be negative, for example a family/pet bereavement. Showing up for you clients in both good and bad times will cement you a place in their heart and dramatically increase their brand loyalty. With these kind of life events, small gestures will go a long way.
Client Appreciation events – Hold ‘surprise’ exclusive events, for just your very best customers (If you offer membership, this is the perfect group to invite). Allocate a healthy budget to make this event great. By providing an amazing, exclusive experience to just a small number of people you will evoke an emotional response that will strengthen the bond between them and your practice. Amazon do a fantastic job of this with their ‘prime day’ events. This is a once-a-year event, offered only to their prime members. On these days Prime members can shop products with exclusive discounts.
Personalised offers – When running re-activation campaigns, try customising the offers to each client. If you know they frequently bought a 12-visit package, then offer them a discount on a 12-visit package. If you know they struggle with Sciatic, then customise your offer around sciatica treatment. By personalising your offers, you show that you care about each person. This technique will directly increase the response rate.
Birthday/Anniversary cards – Cards are a simple way to weave surprise and delight into your business. Your customers are not expecting to receive birthday cards from their chiropractor, so by doing so, you are going above and beyond to show you care. This can also be a great way to re-activate old clients. In Ryan’s clinics we used to send Birthday cards to our highest spending clients, long after they stopped using our services. By doing this, every year they are reminded that you care. This can lead to them coming back into your practice or giving a good review of your practice to a friend or family member. There are several ‘levels‘ to Cards. You CAN automate this process with limited expenditure, time, and effort. However, try not to do this at the detriment of the customisation and surprise of the campaign. To maximise your cards, you need to make them personal to each client, using their name and having the cards handwritten where possible. Including personalised messages based on current events in the customer lives is a sure fast way to evoke an even stronger emotional response.
Gift Bags – Surprise and Delight can also assist front end conversions. Any client who comes for a free spine and posture check, or who attends any of your talks, should receive a free goodie bag. This bag is full off branded products including; small gifts (stress balls, note pad & pen, re-usable water bottles etc.), discount vouchers, testimonial booklets, information about the clinic, healthy snacks and hand written notes. These goodie bags are multi-functional. They aid with the sale, they help build trust in the practice, they surprise and delight whilst swinging the ‘law of reciprocity’ is your favour, so by the end of your session with them, they are looking at ways they can give back to you (We call this an ethical bribe!)
Welcome Packs – A similar strategy to the gift bags, everyone who became a new client at Ryan’s practices would receive a welcome pack full of goodies, information about the practice, referral vouchers and testimonials. This does a similar job to the goodie bags, but also aids in increasing our show up rate. Packs are sent out immediately after someone books, not after they have attended. Therefore, the packs will often reach the client, before their first scheduled appointment.
Newsletter – Your newsletter can be used as a great way to surprise and delight your customers. Receiving something in the post on a regular basis is a tried and tested retention strategy. Making the package bulky, with a brightly coloured envelope will only increase the dopamine kick your clients receive. You can use the content of your newsletter to further surprise and delight. In Ryan’s monthly newsletters, we had a page dedicated to everyone who has joined the practice that month, with every name and first initial included. Having a ‘client of the month’ segment is also a great way to surprise and delight one of your best clients each month. There is nothing quite like seeing your name and picture in a printed document! This section will also double as fantastic testimonials – diving into that client’s health journey with your practice. (PSST… IF YOU ARE AN INNER CIRCLE MEMBER, WE PROVIDE YOU WITH A MONTHLY NEWSLETTER AS PART OF YOUR MEMBERSHIP! PLEASE REACH OUT IF YOU ARE NOT CURRENTLY MAKING THE MOST OF THIS!)
How do other businesses use Surprise and Delight?
I have already mentioned how Amazon and Pret use surprise and delight to enhance their customer experience. But here are a few more examples you can take inspiration from:
Kleenex – The tissue giant has recently turned to social media to engage potential customers with incredible surprises. They monitor social media channels, looking for people posting about being ill or fighting cold/flu. They then reach out to friends and family members of that person who help them orchestrate the surprise (by supplying an address etc.). Within just a couple of hours of the social media post, a ‘’Kleenex Kit’’ filled with Kleenex branded get-well goodies will arrive at their door! 100% of the recipients of the Kleenex kit posted about their experience on social media, which contributed an extra 650,000 impressions for the brand.
Butter Box (Pet Food Subscription) – Here is a touching example of how a ‘life event gift’, full of empathy can have a huge impact. Stuart had an elderly dog who could no longer eat the food supplied by butter box and therefore had to cancel his subscription. Instead of doing nothing, Butter Box reached out and sent a blanket and personal note to Ruby (The Dog). This has no doubt secured a customer for life in Stuart and triggered this post on LinkedIn that has amassed 16,695 engagements and 645 comments.
Delta Airlines – Airlines are renowned for their surprise and delight strategies. From upgrading seats to executive lounges, they have mastered the art of making customers feel special. This example from Delta is a model ‘random act of kindness’ case study and shows delta employees have been briefed to seek out opportunities to overdeliver. In this example the flight attendant went above and beyond to supply the customer with a bag full of Biscoff biscuits, which the customer passes onto his kids as a family ritual when he returns from his travels.
I hope this article has shown you how powerful surprising and delighting your customers can be for your business. If done correctly, it can have a huge positive impact on your retention, referrals, reactivations, and brand perception as a whole. I hope you have been inspired by some of the industry examples and I look forward to hearing what surprise and delight campaigns you incorporate into your practices.
Love and light,
Ry
