How to find new customers

I walked past a shop window in Liverpool earlier today, and saw a big poster which said “10% off for new customers”. It was a big poster in flourescent orange.

The sign was wrong on so many levels. Firstly, it was in a hairdressers window – the colour didn’t exactly fill me with confidence about the quality of service inside. And more importantly, what does it say about the existing loyal customer if they are going to charge new customers 10% less? We need to think about the unintended consequences of our actions.

Too many companies (see banks, insurance companies etc) don’t value their existing customers. Instead, they give all of the incentives to the new customer.

It’s much harder to find a new customer or client than it is to keep an existing one.