“There are three ‘R’ words—retention, repurchase and referral, which can help your company, survive and thrive during the ‘R’ word that’s plaguing our economy, the recession”. Here’s why:

Retention. Retaining your customers is a profitable exercise. Eastman cites a Forrester study that contains an interesting FedEx discovery: improving customer retention by one percent netted an impressive $100 million in revenues.

Repurchase. “A recent report by the CMO Council found that of the organizations queried, 76 percent weren’t fully realizing the revenue of current customers”. By surpassing the expectations of your established client list, and demonstrating the breadth of your capabilities, you can do more than simply secure another sale—you might increase the size of the purchase.

Referral. Positive word-of-mouth is cash in your pocket. A Satmatrix study of the wireless telephone industry found that referrals accounted for half of new customer acquisitions, each worth an average of $1,700.