does a disruptive approach you might use for customer acquisition also work for customer retention?
Today, many companies rely on provocative and disruptive messages to create urgency to change and convince prospects to choose their solution. This approach is especially common—and effective—when the company is the “outsider” looking to unseat an entrenched competitor. This kind of messaging has become essential to overcoming Status Quo Bias, which causes prospects and customers to favor their current situation over doing something new.
But what about when you are the status quo? After all, sometimes you’re the insider. You might already have a large installed base and spend a lot of time and effort trying to ensure renewals and protect existing relationships. If that’s your selling scenario, does the same aggressive messaging approach you might use to convince a prospect to change also work when you’re trying to convince your customer to renew? In other words, should your Why Stay message differ from your Why Change one?
For this behavioral research study, B2B DecisionLabs partnered with Dr. Zakary Tormala, a social psychologist and an expert in persuasion and social influence, to find out which messaging approach to renewals conversations is most effective across several key areas of persuasion, such as loyalty, attitudes, and credibility; as well as likelihood to switch solutions.
