Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques

by Michael Michalko

The resulting ideas for building better customer relationships are: Analyze the customer’s problems and provide the best and most current product information possible to help them address their problems. Entertain customers more with the idea of finding out what’s important and what is not to the customer. Ask key customers to work for me as consultants. Help the customer do more business by supporting their endeavors more. Suggest and initiate marketing programs for key customers. Inform them about what their competition is doing. Become a clearinghouse of information about the customer’s competition. Make sure salespeople are compatible with their accounts; if not, switch accounts to ensure compatibility between salespeople and customers. Give loyal customers preferential treatment. Larger discounts, a special service line, guaranteed response time, better credit terms, and so on.