Do you know who your most important customers are and when was the last time you talked with them? As the leader of your company, have you made the phone call yourself or do you delegate that task to an underling? Do you know if they’re happy with your company or ready to buy more products and/or services from you? … Would it surprise you if they called you today and announced they were ending their business relationship with you?

This is the second part of an on-going series on primary success characteristics indicative of family-owned enterprises. You can read part one, "Understanding what is working". The family-owned company typically is obsessed about customer service to its top clients.  They have an astute understanding of who’s valuable and where each client stands in their relationship matrix.  That’s why it’s not uncommon for many long-term clients to have their origins back to the founding of the company and have deep rooted personal ties to the owners.

For today’s newer enterprises, I have seen the catalyst too many times in too many organizations that when it arises, nausea starts to kick in immediately —  the presentation of the sales pipeline.

Those who lead sales team love to talk about the next shiny object or “potential” conquest. Have you heard these catch phrases?

“We have an in”

“They were interested in our stuff”

“We just need to come to terms on a deal”

Call it the old razzle-dazzle — eyes get bigger and hearts beat faster thinking about all those potential sales coming … if you could land the next big fish. How about the next time that meeting comes up, you throw them a curveball and ask for them to talk about your existing clients first!

Ask your sales team to rank order your customers by some productivity measure.  Total revenue collected in the past year, units sold in the past month, etc. Many companies I’ve had interaction with over the years didn’t know who was at the top of the list. They’re always focused on acquiring the next one which should be the concern of any leader.

Once you rank the customers, ask the team to present the current disposition on each client.  Make sure you grill them on current sales offerings, calls made, emails sent, lunches conducted, whatever your cup of tea is for your particular business model.  The most important take away is identify any “red herrings”.  Is there trouble brewing with a client … it’s been too long since a contact has been made … etc.  Your organization has burned so much energy and money acquiring a client that the cost to reacquire the customer year in and out is minimal.  But to maintain that minimal reacquisition cost and maximize the output from that client, you need to nurture the relationship. Otherwise, if you lose them that reacquisition cost becomes potentially infinite – you may never get the customer back no matter what you do. The simple advice on the red herrings is personally pick up the phone and call the client yourself.  Nothing fixes a problem quicker than the top of the food chain coming from on high and recognizing the client is special and therefore, needs special attention.

Without holding your sales team and managers accountable for the daily interactions with top clients  as well as new prospects, you will be in a perpetual churn cycle and will never build a sustainable viable business.  It must be a top emphasis in any sales meeting.  You must be willing to get personally involved where necessary to maintain the client base!

If your sales team pushes back and says there’s no reason to contact clients unless you need to sell them something, then take some of these suggested reasons for ideas:

• Ask for a referral;
• Just called to say “Thank you, We appreciate your long-standing business with us”;
• Tell them you had great interaction with XYZ employee at their company;
• Get the clients advice and comments about your products and/or services;
• Invite them to a customer advisory board;
• “Happy Birthday!”;
• Always ask for the next sale.

And then again, if they really did make that statement about no reason to call, then you have another root problem in your organization.  A place to look is your incentive program for the sales group.  Is their compensation or bonuses biased to new customer acquisition or balanced against reacquisition/retention?  Based on our briefing above, the clear choice is a balance, if not a shift to emphasize retention.

Venerable family-owned or controlled enterprises have long respected the value of top clients.  They bring the most profits to the company, they refer additional clients, they provide you a wealth of insights into how you’re doing as a company and where your products/services stand in the marketplace. Need I say more. Always challenge your organization to present where your top clients stand in the company … always.