As community pharmacists, we all have our own personal skill sets, values, and characteristics when it comes to providing great customer service. If you ask any pharmacist, I’m certain they can tell you who has most influenced them about excellence in this area.
For many of us, the concept of ‘good old-fashioned pharmacy service’ hasn’t changed, but the way we deliver this certainly has. The world is moving at a faster pace, the way we ‘consume’ has changed, and the value we place on time, efficiency, and useful engagement is more prominent.
So, as the industry faces challenges such as 60-day dispensing, it’s important for us to review all aspects of our businesses and services, but perhaps not overlook the fundamentals of what is really the key driver for most of us: customer retention.
Here, we highlight some data we’ve uncovered that truly puts value on new customer retention and share some examples of how we’re assisting pharmacies to set goals, standards, and activities to drive better engagement with these customers within their stores.
At Scrypt, we recently discovered that the average pharmacy sees around 80 new (prescription) customers a week, with an average GP$ sale value of $24, and that, surprisingly, the average retention rate for these customers over the next six months is as little as 9.6%. That means 90% or more never return.
Annually, that’s business lost from potentially around 3700 returning customers, while an increased retention rate of as little as five per cent could be worth anywhere from $39,000 to $56,000 in gross profit a year for the average store.
So often we put so much time and effort into marketing and finding ways to bring people into our stores, it’s easy to overlook the activities that can be implemented to engage with the network and customers that might already exist within your own database.
So, how do you and your staff now identify and interact with new customers when they visit your pharmacy?
We all say we ‘roll out the red carpet’, but outside of providing excellent service, how do you ensure customers get a memorable experience, and that you’re first to mind next time they’re choosing which pharmacy to visit?
Do you have the data to re-engage with all of them? Are your staff trained to ensure they’ve captured the right amount of contact information, and that they’ve received yours (SMS, mobile, app, loyalty program, etc)? Perhaps it would be useful to ensure this type of re-engagement is automated.
Also, how are you tracking this type of data collection, and have you set KPIs for being contactable?
Further, do you have an easy way to monitor the percentage of mobile numbers, emails, DOB or ASL registrations?
Are your staff on board to ask for this information from every customer, and can they track their compliance themselves?
And finally, what are you doing with this information? Do you have a new customer retention strategy? What access to data do you have, and how easy is it to implement actions when trying to engage with these customers?
Scrypt software comes with a range of free analytic tools as well as an opportunity to create bespoke reports, which are focused on providing useful and actionable data to better engage, build relationships, and delight your customers. If you’re looking for support or ideas in this area, reach out to our team.
Sam has 15 years’ experience within the pharmacy industry, including in the community, policy/advocacy and now digital health.