Customers who get what they were promised are more likely to stay. Put that way it sounds obvious. But a new customer, in the first weeks, is still checking one thing: did you do what you said?
What the research found
A meta-analysis pooled 214 studies of people using a system, mostly consumer apps and e-learning. Where the system did what people had expected, they were more satisfied, and more of them said they would keep using it. It is one of the most often replicated results in marketing and information systems research, though nearly all of it measures what people say they intend, not what they later did.
Studies of real behaviour point the same way, more modestly. Among the customers of a mobile phone company, those who were more satisfied before any decision to cancel stayed longer, and the author's advice was to focus on customers early in the relationship: if their first experiences disappoint, the relationship is likely to be short. Among more than 2,000 business service contracts, the customers whose decision-makers were satisfied were more likely to upgrade.
What it means for you
Say you promised a customer online booking within a week. Three weeks later it still is not live. Whatever else you do well, the one thing they were checking has failed, and an offer for a second product at that point asks them to trust you again before you have earned it the first time.
None of this argues against selling more. In the contract study, satisfied business customers upgraded more often. The advice is about order: the promise first, the offer after. Nobody has tested that order as such, but it is a fair reading of what the research does show.
With each new customer
- Promise only what you can deliver, and say when. If setup takes your team two weeks, say two weeks, not one.
- Get it working early, and show them it works. Book the first appointment through the new system together, rather than waiting for them to find out on their own.
- Offer extras once they are using what they bought, not on day one.
How Bamya CRM helps
Bamya CRM is a free AI-assisted CRM. It shows what each customer bought, and reminds you to check in, so you know what you promised and when to ask how it is going.
Research: Mishra et al. (2023), International Journal of Information Management; Bhattacherjee (2001), MIS Quarterly; Bolton (1998), Marketing Science; Bolton, Lemon & Verhoef (2008), Journal of Marketing. Most of the evidence is what people, largely consumers and students, say they intend, and the links are associations, not proof that keeping a promise is what makes customers stay.