Acquiring and keeping customers is the yin and yang of any business. We need customers to win new ones. Yet, most businesses treat customer acquisition and retention as if they were contraries — like summer and winter.
Customer acquisition is seen like summer. Long glorious days that are relished and celebrated. Customer retention like winter, which must be dealt with in anticipation of sunnier days. That is because the focus, from Wall Street to Main Street, is predominantly on customer acquisition growth.
Yet acquisition and retention are two sides of the same coin. Acquisition is the expansion side — new net, add-on sales and renewal. Retention is the loss mitigation side — churn, abandonment and downgrades.
