This books worth a little investment and whilst its not available free online anywhere, it offers a solid approach to looking at customer loyalty and word of mouth to grow your business. There are some significant pointers particularly the Net Promoter Score which lays out how to truly measure customer feedback and ensuring you grow your business through good profits not bad.

The most useful thinking though is the idea to stop doing customer research now using more traditional questioning and just ask one “Would you recommend us to a friend?”  It also touches on the golden rule of customer loyalty “treat people how you would like to be treated.”

Buying growth is expensive, Fred Reichheld suggests there are easier and more rewarding ways of growing a business and he’s right.