So you think your customers are loyal? Better be sure or you may lose them.

• Author: Costabilo, Frank P., Jr.
• Position: PERFECTLY FRANK

Do you have a formalized customer-satisfaction and customer-loyalty program? It's a simple enough question, isn't it?

But one not so easily answered by a large number of small and medium-sized businesses.

Here are some of the answers I hear on a daily basis directly from both the presidents and business owners of these firms:

1) We have a full-time sales staff; it's their job to handle customer loyalty.

2) We've done business with our customers for decades; we wouldn't benefit from this program.

3) Our customers are loyal; they buy something from us every month!

As a successful business consultant who has developed customer satisfaction and customer loyalty programs for the past 12 years, I can help dispel some of the popular mythology surrounding the concept of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty and, most importantly, explain why every business needs a dedicated professional handling this assignment.

Myth No. 1 (also known as the salesman myth): Sales people do not have the time, or genuine interest, to develop, execute and maintain a customer-satisfaction program. These people are typically so busy selling that it completely consumes their time. As a result, there simply isn't enough time in the day to perform this critical task.

Myth No. 2 (also known as the established account myth): Doing business with someone for 40 years is no guarantee that you will earn their business in the 41st year. Your customers' needs will change over time and contact people in accounts change even faster these days. It only makes sense to have a program geared to routinely test and confirm each account's ongoing satisfaction and loyalty.

Myth No. 3 (also known as the buyer frequency myth): If you have a customer that has bought 500 widgets from you every month for the last 10 years, who is to say that they won't need another 200 widgets starting next month? Your sales person should know this, but if he fails to ask the right question at the right time, one of your competitors may sneak in and fulfill this newly evolving need. Frequency of purchasing is an unreliable indicator of customer loyalty at best ... maybe they're just buying from you because your competitor has not taken the time to call them? What happens...