Home : Triple Your Income from the Customers You Already Have

Triple Your Income from the Customers You Already Have

Posted by Michael Sexton on 1/29/2007 at 9:20 PM
Posted in Entrepreneurship, Marketing

You probably don’t think of your customers as expenses. But if you add up all the money you spent to win their business, you will discover how costly they really are. To win them, you spent a lot of money on advertising, salespeople, a Website and other marketing initiatives too.

Customers are costly. In fact, many businesses report that it takes more than a year before a typical customer represents a profit, not an expense.

What is the solution? You could go on spending money to win more customers - and you should. But you need to do something else too:

You need to generate more income from the customers you already have.

Here are some proven strategies that can get that job done - whether you are a small startup or a major corporation.

Strategy one: Build loyalty. In other words, get your customers to buy exclusively from you, not from your competitors. If you own a coffee bar, hand out little cards that entitle your customers to a free eleventh cup of coffee after they have bought 10. Or if you are a car dealer, offer attractive predetermined trade-in prices for the new vehicles you sell, provided that your customers turn them in on the next cars they buy from you.
Strategy two: Offer volume discounts to encourage your customers to buy more. If you have a landscaping company, offer a year’s service to customers who prepay for the next ten months. That sounds like you are lowering your per-month price, and you are. But the point is, you are selling at volume and boosting your cash flow.
Strategy three: Upsell your customers to more expensive products. Airlines do it when they encourage current economy-fare customers to upgrade to first-class tickets. You can do it too. If you own a health club, for example, upsell your customers to more expensive memberships that include exclusive classes, massages and a tempting array of bundled benefits.
Strategy four: Expand your product line. If you build swimming pools, start selling water purification systems to your current customers too. Or if you operate a martial arts school, introduce new self-defense courses for the parents of the children who already come to your school.

Be imaginative. Tripling the dollars you earn from each customer is an achievable goal. Apply the strategies I outline above. Stick to them. You will soon discover that even incremental income growth from each of your current customers will quickly make your profits soar.

To learn more about increasing your profits with creative marketing, be sure to investigate The Marketing Mastery Program from Trump University. Classes are forming now.

Michael Sexton is President of Trump University.

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15 Comments Post a comment

Posted by Gary A. on 01/30/2007 6:50 AM

Great advice but you left off one key point:

THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT.

Treat your customers fairly and honestly and not only will they continue to do business with you but they will also recommend your company to their friends and peers.

gea

Posted by member1366890 on 01/30/2007 8:59 AM

Mr. Schultz and Starbucks coffee, great marketing example.

Ina Matijevic***

Posted by u208502 on 01/30/2007 10:58 AM

Great advice on generating the cash flow up front and increasing loyalty with the customer you have had for awhile, but where most company's struggle is service after the sale! Don't ever take the loyal customer for granted. Once they don't feel appreciated or special anymore they will leave.

Paul B

Posted by u99229 on 01/30/2007 2:02 PM

I agree with gea below...Customers that are loyal to you can certainly provide referrals for you and your Company to other prospects who they know will want your goods and services.

A loyal customer is a goldmine, and is great for networking. I think that what's just as important is to tell them 'thank you' for the referral, even if the prospect does not buy your product. It's about the effort on their part.

Posted by Chris from Biz-Names.Biz on 01/30/2007 2:51 PM

The upsell is always important. I've noticed that I will often buy more products or services when someone makes a suggestive sell and explains why the additional purchase will make a difference for me. Sometimes the customer doesn't realize an option is available or isn't thinking about it.

Posted by Mark in Cheyenne WY on 01/30/2007 4:09 PM

Leverage your loyal customers to refer you to people just like them.
And drop the high maintenance/low margin customers for your competition to pick up.
Keeping in touch with your loyal customers and giving service above and beyond their expectations enables you to ASK them for referral business. Give, ask, then receive.
And find some way to immediately reward the person that referred you. DO NOT wait for the deal to close or your referring client will feel they are just a paycheck for you

MP

Posted by user54303 on 01/30/2007 4:22 PM

I am a martial art entrepreneur in the D/FW area. I have 20 locations (Tong Il lo Martial Science), I run an international organization (ICMAA), I operate the 1st & now # 1 martial art media Podcast (Karate Kast), and I now own a new patented martial art product that will be soon released. After being a subscriber to Trump University, I have increased my knowledge 100-fold about the business world.

This, article you wrote is very true on how one can increase one's income by using your current customers over & over again. Many of the topics mentioned in TU articles are changed around slightly, to suit my industries needs, and discussed them in my monthly instructor meetings. All I can say about TU is that "Knowledge is Power".

Also, I have to mention that a previously comment was posted, that the customer is always right. I must protest that statement. After being in business for 25 years, I can honestly say that comment IS WRONG! Although, we must strive to give the best service we can give. No body (not even the customer) knows my business better than me. So, if the customer does not have the same view point or knowledge of what my service is about, or what my over all goals are that my service is providing, the customer may be incorrect. REMEMBER, YOU CAN'T PLEASE EVERYONE!!!

Tell the Don that I think that he's awesome. Keep TU strong and motivating!

Respectfully,
Grandmaster William McDonald

Posted by user75624 on 01/30/2007 5:45 PM

Customer is not always right... Out of sight out of mind.. Always drop a letter or call at least every 3 months to stay in touch... A satisfied customer tells 10 a dissatisfied one tells 100...
greg

Posted by member1404668 on 01/30/2007 9:06 PM

Michelle was out numbered...The team didn't like her and she say the writing on the wall so she pulled out her silver spoon and placed it right back into her mouth... she knows nothing about street smarts... I would take street smarts over 90% of business degrees...... Most great successful buiness people do not have a B.A or B.S or M.A or PHD... most are off the smarts of the streets with out reflectors... I too would match my wits against any of them.

Posted by member1500123 on 01/31/2007 12:28 AM

Why, after admitting that she is an alcoholic and has a drug problem is Tara Conner allowed to represent the United States. Is this the best that we have to offer??? We'll next get to see her naked body in a men's magazine which you've already suggested. What have you allowed this to come to? Do you really think that this is a good example for our little girls??

Posted by member1423174 on 01/31/2007 7:56 AM

I also agree quitters loose. I think the pressure of living in a tent brings people to a certain realazation about life that nothing is for certain. The reality becomes more real when there is a mansion next door. This in itself is enough to elimante most quiters.
However I do think people can learn from their mistakes and end up succeeding.
When you really think about it. How bad is liviing in a tent on a hill over looking the City lights next to mansion. She had free room and board. All she had to do was focus and win.

I think the winner will come out of the team that stays in the tent the longest. The quitter will only look back and wish she would have stuck it out as it is one of thoose expeareances that may only come once in life.

Posted by member1366890 on 02/01/2007 5:59 AM

I
li
ke
this
green
colour!
I
n
a
Matijevic:-()iiiiiiiiiiii

Posted by member1452082 on 02/02/2007 10:48 PM

I have never taken a client for lunch or spent any money to attract new ones.

I provide accurate designs, reasonable fee structure and fast turnaround time on my electrical and mechanical working drawings for commercial buildings.

I have new clients banging on my door every week. (I have a closed practice and refuse over 100 projects a year)

The customer is not always right. That is bull****. Who evey wrote that must have kissed ass his/her whole life.

Mutual respect is the key.

Michael J. Mark, P.Eng., BSc EE

IS DONALD TRUMP COMING TO BOOK EXPO AMERICA AT THE JAVITS CENTER (NYC) ON JUNE 1,2,3 2007?

I'll be in Booth 1802.

www.m2engineering.com

www.workingclassengineer.com

www.bookexpoamerica.com

Posted by lightwayvez on 02/10/2007 10:25 AM

I agree the customer wants to walk away feeling special treatment has been afforded to them, comparatively does not the employer feel the same way too ? An unhappy employer can damage a product line just as much if not more than an unhappy customer.

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make them drink it.

In the business of schools and universities the pay off comes with the student's success and the output of information after the fact.

Sometimes the payoff does not include with it some several million tonnes of air dropped cash in the nomination of one hundred dollar bills ?

There are some things money cannot buy.

(c) Isabelle Morgan lightwayvez

Posted by member1541181 on 03/15/2007 5:49 AM

Generally, I like four strategies presented, it looks like an expanding system for making more popular each of the businesses taken as example. This in economy is called: maximal use of labor and capital investments that of course contributes to:
1. Lower the prices of services and increase of incomes;
2. Makes the company more competitive.

Driton

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