Ideas for thriving in today's market

I was recently introduced to these ideas and thought that I would share them with you

1. Secure your core customers.  It costs five to seven times as much to get a new customer as it does to keep the ones you already have.
2. Push for greater market share. Slashing prices is not the way to go – it signals to your competitors that you are likely to be in trouble. So concentrate on service to your established customers and selling that same service to new  prospects
3. Research customers now more than ever. Stay close to your customers; make sure that you understand how they are changing. You don’t want to find yourself relying on old information, or with a business model that customers don’t want.
4. Seek to increase - or a least maintain - your marketing budget. This is the worst time to think about cutting your marketing budget. Progressive organizations add to their marketing budgets in hard times.
5. Quickly drop what is not working. Removing failing activities before they cause too much damage.
6. Don’t discount your best products. Discounting tells your customers that you were probably overcharging in the first place, it also makes it difficult if not impossible to raise the prices again.
7. Save the best; lose the others. In a difficult economy, you need to make your best products even better. Don’t waste time or money on products that are adding nothing to your core income.