There’s an old saying about friendship advising we should “make new friends but keep the old. One is silver, the other is gold.”

The same is true for customers. Generating new customers ensures a healthy sales funnel. But old customers — the ones who have given you their business, their trust and their money — are no less important. Nurturing relationships with established customers can be the single most critical strategy for growing your business. Why?

• Your current customers already have a relationship with you. They already believe in your company and your product. No expensive ad or promotional incentive is needed to win their approval. They just need regular acknowledgement that their loyalty is valued. Existing customers are your quickest route to a sale and yield the highest ROI!
• Word of mouth is powerful marketing. Happy customers act as ambassadors for your company. They personally endorse your products and services to their professional and social networks.
• Conversely, an unsatisfied customer or one that doesn’t feel valued by a company can have a strong adverse effect on your business. Author and business coach Vadim Kotelnikov states that the No. 1 reason customers jump ship to a competitor is because they sense indifference on the part of a service provider. When that happens, the only one who wins is your competitor.

In the words of Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club: “There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.”