Creating a loyal and respectful relationship with a potential customer builds basis for all other areas of business success.

Simply stated, without customers, our businesses would all fail.

A satisfied customer is a customer who provides a continual income stream and refers others.

Business success starts with customer. The following six strategies outline best and most effective business success practices.

1.Customer Service. Typically 68% of a business' customers leave or go elsewhere for products and services because they feel they are under appreciated or unimportant.

The perception a customer has of his/her value to a business plays a very large role in whether or not customer returns.

What can you do to improve on that statistic? Smile, ask questions, be friendly and say "Thank You".

Customer service is a seriously neglected facet of most businesses. As an owner you must set example for your employees.

No one can do this for you. You can't pay an outside consultant to smile for you. If you aren't sure where to start, then pick up a copy of "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie.

2.Existing customers. Another neglected area in most businesses is act of communicating with existing customers. I can't remember last time a business I frequented sent me a coupon or note or anything for that matter.

Keeping in contact with customers does not have to be an extensive and time-consuming endeavor. A monthly newsletter, a quarterly coupon mailing or a special occasion or holiday is sufficient. The idea here is not to sell them something but to simply remind them that you exist and value their business.

3.Referrals. If you are not offering an incentive to your existing customers to refer new customers to you, you are missing out on a huge profit center.

Referral coupons are one way of enticing customers to refer. If a coupon makes it back to you with a new customer, then referring customer gets a "spiff". A "spiff" can be a discount coupon, movie tickets, or a free item, anything that shows value.

To increase effectiveness, one should first apply creative thought, which is meant to be daring, uninhibited, free-spirited, imaginative, unpredictable, and revolutionary. The trick is to ignore content and maximise size and richness of idea pool.

Second, critical thinking is exercised to achieve applied creativity. This is reductive, logical, focused, conservative, practical and feasible. During this stage, idea pool is reduced to achievable, appropriate ideas.

Now onto Idea Pool itself:

Maximising size and richness of idea pool is a conscious process that has a lot in common with a) lateral thinking and b) elicitation of tacit knowledge. It is pre-critical thinking phase and some elements include: