• by Chad Little , June 8, 2010

Love it or hate it -- whatever your position on social media, the craze has proven at least one thing: relationships online matter. Not just hits, or visitors, or connections, or even followers. It's called Customer Relationship Management for a reason.

Problem is, over time we can forget we're in a relationship and only realize too late that we lost a customer's business because we lost that personal touch. But how can we avoid this mistake?

Sometimes all we need is a trigger that helps us get out of the day to day. Something that helps remind us that it's not all about goals, revenue, etc. If you don't have a relationship with your clients going forward, you're vulnerable.

Our business has a core value of "hug our clients and hug them often." At the heart, what we're trying to address is the constant need for establishing a true relationship with our clients that extends way beyond product offerings and the value received for them. What used to be "above and beyond" now has to be a way of life in today's competitive environment.

At each of our company meetings we highlight examples where we feel we've hugged our clients. The examples range from the obvious to the laugh-out-loud. We have hugged clients with the tried-and-true greeting card (dog-themed, of course) and free coffee coupon. Then there was the Singing Thank-You Telegram featuring a dog costume that somehow ended up with a lion's head and a singer who forgot the words -- heart-stopping for us, but the client loved it.

As a self-proclaimed "start-up junkie," I'm always amazed and delighted to watch a company grow and see its core culture take hold without my involvement -- the "Wow, I had no idea that was happening" effect. We recently went through a reorganization of responsibilities where the account management group was given several new roles.

As part of this reorganization, the team members challenged themselves to identify ways they could further the customer relationship while taking on the new responsibilities. What they came up with put a smile on my face -- a creative, original, and fun idea I had never thought of: a client scavenger hunt.

The idea was to force themselves out of a regular day-to-day business cycle and make a contest out of it. Instead of just pushing to get clients signed up, get their campaigns live with our service, and optimize their accounts, they would strive to know more about each client personally.

The team developed a list of 50 personal (but not too personal) questions they would "scavenge" from their clients. Some of the data points were birthday, favorite color, kids' names, and "Best Coffee: Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts?" Each time an account manager gleaned some new information from a client, they tallied a point on the department scoreboard.

How'd they do? One person jumped to an early and insurmountable lead in the competition, but the scoreboard showed impressive results all around. The scavenging not only produced closer client relationships, but also built up the team as a side-effect. As one account manager told me, "Having [the scavenger hunt list] in front of me helped to remind me that the person on the other side of the phone was human. It helped me to make an emotional connection with them without coming across too pushy."

So your challenge -- if you choose to accept it -- is to develop your own ways to keep the relationships with your customers fresh. What kind of encouragement, incentives, and competitions could you use? Please post your ideas in the comments section -- I'd love to hear what you come up with.