I’m taking my wallet and going home!

When your customers defect, they take thousands--if not tens or hundreds of thousands--of dollars with them. Even if all you sell are pizzas.

Harvard Business Review reports that the lifetime revenue stream from a loyal pizza buyer is $8,000. A loyal Cadillac buyer? $332,000. A corporate purchaser of commercial aircraft? Billions.

Now you may not sell Boeing 787 Dreamliners (average cost: $162 million), but customer defections could still be costing your business big bucks.

First, let's look at why your customers are not coming back. According to a major U.S.-based research firm, here is the typical breakdown:

• 3% move away
• 5% follow a friend or relative's advice and switch
• 9% find a better product or service
• 14% switch due to product dissatisfaction
• 68% leave because of indifference

Bad enough 28 percent never come back because they were convinced to switch, they found a better product or service or were dissatisfied. But indifference? Two out of three people simply felt unloved, unwanted, ignored or otherwise not valued.

Two things about that. First, if 68 percent of people feel unloved by your competition, what an opportunity! But more to the point, those lost customers are far more valuable that you might think. Let's explore this a little.

Here is what happens when you lose a customer. You get no repeat business (money down the drain) and fewer, if any, referrals (more money down the drain). On top of that, there is the cost of replacing that customer (even more money down the drain).

Want to improve revenues? Want to do it at a much lower cost per customer? Take some of that money you currently spend looking for new customers and use it to keep the ones you have. They'll love you for it.