EPISODE 76 OF WHAT WOULD THEY DO? THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE PODCAST FOR SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS
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In this episode, I’m unpacking a cancellation survey response from a former Retention Lab member that perfectly captures one of the biggest misconceptions I see in online business:
“I’m focused on getting members right now, so there’s no need to focus on retention.”
The problem? Retention and acquisition aren’t two separate strategies.
Every interaction someone has with your business, from the moment they discover you, is shaping whether they’ll trust you, buy from you, and eventually come back again.
In this episode, I explain why I believe retention starts long before a purchase, how I build that philosophy into my own business, and the small changes you can make to create more personalised customer journeys without rebuilding your entire funnel.
If you’ve ever thought retention was something you could “worry about later”, this episode might completely change how you think about your customer experience.
What we cover:
Why customer retention starts before the sale
The surprising insight from a member cancellation survey
What I mean by “Love at First Click”
Why treating every subscriber the same hurts conversions
How personalised customer journeys increase trust
The connection between relevance, customer experience and retention
Three stages every retention ecosystem should cover
One simple way to make your email marketing more human without rebuilding your entire funnel
Soundbites:
“I like to call it love at first click. This click is the start to hopefully a long-term relationship if you set it up intentionally. And everything that happens after that first click should be specifically designed to nurture valuable, specific, highly relevant human-first relationships with your audience that then ultimately lead to a first purchase and next purchase because everything in your ecosystem is specifically tailored to what they need to hear at the right time.”
“Trust is harder to earn and much easier to lose. And if someone’s first interactions with you feel totally generic, irrelevant, not linked to what they signed up for in the first place, then you’ve already lost some of that trust before they even get to any purchase decision that you present them with. If that first click feels like noise and you don’t deliver on that promise, then there’s no retention strategy that can fix that down the track.”
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Episode Transcript:
Nadine (00:00)
Hey, hey, and welcome back to the podcast. Today’s episode is taking a closer look at something that recently happened in my
Business, I am going to look into a response that I’ve received to my one question cancellation survey inside retention lab. Basically, as soon as you hit cancel, you get a confirmation email, and there is one powerful question in it that asks for the main reason you canceled, apart from money funds and cash flow.
And this particular member answered as follows. I’m more focused on getting members right now, so there’s no need to focus on retention at the moment. And that is an exact quote of the past member’s response. So I want to challenge something.
I believe that a lot of business owners currently hold about the concept of retention. They look at retention as something that happens after the sale. Once someone’s bought, once someone’s joined the membership, once someone has purchased from you and handed over some cash. But that’s simply not true. And today I want to.
Pull it apart, look at the deeper issues behind this statement, and use my business as an example how you can embed a retention mindset in your business from the get-go.
the biggest problem I have with this mindset is that
people have retention in mind once someone has handed over cash and then panic around how they can keep them. Which means everything that happens before the purchase, whether it is an email, a click, a piece of content that someone engages with, gets treated as pure acquisition, right? It is designed to get people into their world
And they’ll then worry about what happens next down the track. But retention should be in the back of your mind from the moment someone first interacts with you and your brand. I like to call it love at first click. if you’ve been in my world, you might have heard it before. basically that initial click where someone clicks on a link on your website, clicks on a freebie link.
Against the summit presentation that you’ve done. Whatever that first click looks like. this click is the start to hopefully a long-term relationship if you set it up intentionally. And everything that happens after that first click should be specifically designed to nurture valuable, specific, highly relevant human-first relationships with your audience that then ultimately lead to a first purchase.
And next purchase because everything in your ecosystem is specifically tailored to what they need to hear at the right time. So now you’re going, Nadine, what does that look like in your business? You talked about how that applies to you. Hear me out I
Obviously, I love growing my email list. I know we need to have fresh eyeballs on our offers, on our business at all times. But it’s one thing to add someone to my email list and then be done with it and lump them with the same emails every week, no matter what signals they’ve sent me. and lots of businesses stop right there and treat that as the win. Someone has signed up to their email list, tick, my job is done. But
What happens next matters so much more than that initial sign up. Yes, whatever you said resonated with that person, but the first click is only the start of the relationship. So rather than sending everyone down the exact same path and sending people the exact same emails, the exact same content, I let people steer their own path through my offer suite based on what they’re interested in.
and what signals they’re sending me. And that one shift does three things all at once. It increases my customer lifetime value because people end up exactly where they’re meant to be. they’re ending up in the perfect evergreen funnel. They’re ending up with a perfectly tailored touch point. and everything feels totally tailored to them.
It also improves my customer retention because the experience fields built for them, their interest, their current situation, rather than a mass blast to my email list. And it actually decreases my unsubscribes because the content people receive stays genuinely relevant to them. None of this happens after any sale. So I start this process as soon as someone signs up.
To my email list as soon as someone gives me a nod with that first click, and it happens from the first interaction someone has with my emails. If you’re curious what that looks like and you’re not on my email list, obviously make sure you jump on it so you can see for yourself. And in 2026, with increasing AI use, increasing same same, it matters even more today than it used to three years ago.
Trust is harder to earn and much easier to lose. And if someone’s first interactions with you feel totally generic, irrelevant, not linked to what they signed up for in the first place, then you’ve already lost some of that trust before they even get to any purchase decision you present them with.
Funnily enough, the data backs all of this up. In the State of the Customer Report 2025, the new one’s coming soon. Stay tuned. customers consistently pointed to clarity and a relevance of messaging as the things that keep them engaged and keep them hooked on a brand. they want to feel that what they’re receiving actually.
applies to them is specifically speaking to their current pain points and the goals that they’re working towards. So if that first click feels like noise and you don’t deliver on that promise, then there’s no retention strategy that can fix that down the track. So now let’s get to that next question. What does a strategic retention ecosystem
Look like. a retention ecosystem that works and is intentional, touches all three phases of the transaction. So before the sale, during the sale, and after the sale.
let’s start before the sale. Is the content someone receives shaped by what they actually care about? Or is everyone getting the exact same sequence, email, message, regardless of how they joined your list and why they signed up? If we’re looking at during the sale, does the path to purchase? So how will they get from intrigue to purchase decision feel
Bespoke to where they’re at, or are you just funneling everyone through that same generic offer, regardless of fit and whether someone has sent you any signals that they might be remotely interested? And then after the sale, are you actually continuing to listen to what they engage with and what they click on and what they show an interest in? Or does the personalization, stop the moment someone has handed over that cash?
That should be a thread that runs through your entire relationship. So retention thinking needs to be part of every decision you make in your business from that first click through to the first and next purchase. and it can’t be bolted on as an afterthought. So how can you get started with your own human-first retention ecosystem?
You don’t need to rebuild your entire funnel to start applying this today. Obviously, I suspect you have systems in place, you have funnels in place that will take a little while to update. I would start by looking at where you’re currently treating every new subscriber exactly the same, regardless of what brought them to you. So potentially have a look at your onboarding sequence, whether you can incorporate
Trigger links, for example, and clever ways to pay attention to the signals they’re sending you to then funnel them down even more bespoke pathways. even one small touch point where you let someone self-select based on interest and what they’ve come here for
Is a first step towards a retention ecosystem instead of a one-size-fits-all funnel
So if you’re now feeling somewhat overwhelmed, you love the idea of starting your retention mindset with that first click, but you don’t know where to start. That’s what I can help you do inside the Incubator, which is the high touch level of retention lab. And that’s where we’re working through what your own offer suite and customer journey could look like.
With human-first conversion and retention strategies built in from that first click. So if you’re curious, check out the link in the show notes and feel free to DM me if you have any questions and want more information. if you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, hopefully I’m going to see you next week. Make sure you hit subscribe, follow, and share this episode with anyone who might need a bit of re-educating around retention thinking as well. So
Thank you so much for tuning in and I will see you next week.
