Frequent communication is one of the top overall long term priorities you should have to accomplish the goal you desire… the more effective you want it to be the higher the cost its going to be in the short term… start with email newsletters, add a free monthly newsletter/magalogue and send it to your customers, and finally a paid newsletter as well…

Ways to get their info/email/mail… the contest idea is swell as mentioned by another redditor, here are a few more: create a report/informational product that is both offline and online and that is highly desireable by the customer and they can recieve it in exchange for their email/mail (for online email, for offline email and mail). To give it to them offline, have it close to the till and then offer it to everybody at the start/end of a transaction… an idea for what the info product could be “10 trending winter outfits for stressed out moms who just want to look fabulous” and when spring comes, just switch the “winter” to “spring”. You can have such seasonal reports to give out and other ones as well. Say you get many goths and moms coming to your store, well you could have one info product designed for goths and one info product designed for moms, the only thing that matters is that you then create 2 separate email lists and create separate email follow ups on them…

Next up create a “wall of fame”… have like multiple categories for it as well like “Best Customer” “Best Referer” “Highest Spenditure” “Client of the Month” “Client of the Season” “Client of the Year” and so on… i wouldnt have any more than 3 but I would definitely start with “Best something” and “Best Referer”… people like to be recognized for their patronage and by having a wall of fame you are doing just that (best source = streamers, nearly all of them have a “highest donors” section and you will notice that many of those highest donors are also the most frequent donors as well).

I dont know if you are doing this already, but try to get to know the customers that come in to your store. And your staff should be doing this as well (which probably means you will have to supervise them).

I would also create a “first time customer voucher” where they basically get like 25$ to 50$ free for the first time a customet buys from you, but in exchange for that vouchet the customer had to give email/mail/birthday/name. With that info, you can send personalised birthday cards alongside “birthday offers”. Here is a very cool and ingenious trick I learned from a brilliant marketer who ran her own flower and card shop. For birthdays and valentine’s days (and other primarly romantic and special events) she would send a letter/card to the significant other of targeted customer and ask them how much they would he willing to give their spouse for a birthday gift card… I love this, its genuinely one of the most brilliant and original ideas I have learned and I have implemented this exact idea in my own business, its truly amazing.

Create and make sure that your customers are aware that your business is a referral business. You do this through your marketing and advertising. However, you can easily solicit referrals from customers by simply asking them. This is best done when the customet just bought, its even more potent if you just gave them a voucher or discount or something. However, there its important that you dont just say “would you refer someone?” And leave it there. For best results, the conversation should look something like this: “Ms. X, as you are aware, our store runs on referrals from valued and loyal clients such as yourself. With this in mind, who are the 3 people you know that you would refer to my shop” “thats great Ms. X. Let me write down their names and phone numbers so that I can reach out to them…” Basically it should look like that. Yeah it may be awkward the first few times and some customers may feel weird about it, but all in all, it works. Also when speaking to customers, please dont refer to them as a customer, but instead as something more prestiged or important like “Valued Client” “Important Patron” etc…

I have many, many more ways to ensure repeat customer patronage but this post is already long so I will stop there. If you got questions regarding some of the ideas presented, ask and I will elaborate/explain further if required.