Jay Abraham is one of our favorite teachers. He often talks about the lifetime value of a customer. Earning the business of a new customer is one of the three pillars of business development success. The other two as taught by Jay are to increase the average sale and increase the number of transactions per customer. This is a great lesson linked to recognizing the lifetime value of a customer. I have never met anyone who does not understand or does not agree with the principle. That is where it stops. Companies understand but ignore the principle.
Recently I was preparing for a presentation to a group of business owners. Part of my outline was discussing how to increase the return on investment in marketing spending. In discussing the key actions business need to take, it occurred to me that I could not identify one company that I do business with that has an effective marketing program. My criteria for that conclusion is customer recognition. I receive no personalized thank you cards. I receive not personalized special offers or incentives. There is a huge opportunity for companies to increase their business revenue and profits simply by recognizing their current customers. Exec Net Consulting (www.ExecNetConsulting.com) provides specific guidance to companies on improving their marketing programs. We also handle the complete outsourcing of customer relation and new customer development campaigns. These campaigns include, internet marketing, direct mail marketing, email campaigns, web site design, web site hosting, search engine optimization and more.