7 Reasons to Obsess About Your Best Customers

THE BIG IDEA: Here are seven benefits for making your best customers the central focus of your organization’s primary directive.

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No matter how big your marketing budget, you can’t market to everyone. The more restricted your budget, the more intelligent your approach needs to be.

Your best customers are your Brand Lovers. Understanding the needs of your Brand Lovers and serving them better than anyone else is critical if you want to outmaneuver the competition and grow your market share.

Here are seven reasons why your Brand Lovers are so important:

1. Your Brand Lovers choose you more often than your competitors. To most Mac users, there’s no alternative competitor to choose from.
2. Your Brand Lovers spread the word about your brand and create new customers for you. Basically, your best customers are the source of your word-of-mouth stream.
3. Your Brand Lovers are by nature loyal customers. Customer loyalty is a better determinant of profitability than mass appeal.
4. Focusing on your Brand Lovers gives your organization a singular vision of whom you’re trying to serve. Too many companies chase too many different kinds of customers and dilute their efforts in the process.
5. Similarly, serving your best customers can lead to explosive return on investment (ROI). Example: When Apple opened their retail stores they expected to generate $1,000/square foot. They actually generated $4,000/square foot. Ultimately, your Brand Lovers drive the profitability of your business.
6. Think about what would happen if you turned just 10% of your occasional customers into Brand Lovers. For large enterprises, this shift can represent a sizeable revenue increase.
7. By focusing on your Brand Lovers, you can build a powerful brand that stands for something meaningful to them. This gives you clear differentiation in the marketplace and helps you organically attract more of your most profitable customers.

The bottom line is that serving your best customers is the surest way to grow a strong, profitable business—in any economic climate.