Turn Your Credit Program Into a Competitive Advantage

Your products, pricing, and customer relationships are likely the cornerstones of how you attract and keep your customers. But have you ever considered how your credit program could provide you with a strong competitive advantage?

If you are like many companies, your credit program probably doesn’t make you think about growth and competitive advantage. In fact, it probably does the opposite — bringing on thoughts of thoughts of long pay cycles and manual, time-consuming credit processes. But it doesn’t have to. Consider these three ways your credit program can deliver a competitive advantage:

Customer request larger lines of credit and longer pay cycles. By offering pros more of what they need, you’ll earn more of their business.

With in-house credit, you may not always be able to meet these credit needs, and the additional credit exposure may increase your risk to a level that you’re not comfortable with.

An option to consider is a professional credit management service that can offer larger lines and extended terms for your customers — without risk to you. You can get paid for every sale without having to wait 60 to 90 days or more — which means you can offer your customers what they need without taking on increased risk.

Success is no longer just the absence of problems. Sure, customers expect you to have the product they need, have it delivered promptly, have the order be accurately fulfilled, and be billed without error. However, in the world where Amazon has revolutionized the consumer buying experience – and has eyes on doing the same for business – saving customers’ time will earn you sticky, hard-to-leave relationships.

Everything we need as a consumer is online – purchases with your credit card company, ability to pay your phone bill, etc. In B2B, however, that’s still considered cutting edge. Consider investing in online customer account management capabilities. Rather than customers having to call your business and you paying staff to service these needs, make it simple for your customers to get what they need, whenever they need it. They should be able to download a statement, view past purchases, make a payment online, request more credit, dispute a charge, and any other common use case. They’ll get addicted to the ease and routine of serving their own needs.

A rewards program helps you thank your customers for their business and gives them more reasons to spend with you. But managing a rewards program can be time consuming and complex. Working with a credit service like BlueTarp makes it easy for you to offer enticing rewards such as adventure travel, sports packages and brand-name merchandise, without the overhead and expense. You can also pick which customers qualify for rewards, so you can use the program to drive spending with your biggest and most profitable customers or to win new ones.