February 2002How to build customer loyalty in an Internet world
CIO Magazine 2/1/2002
by Edward Prewitt
Customer loyalty seems like a quaint notion in the Internet age, when customers can search out lower prices and defect to competitors with a mouse-click. Yet the research of Bain Fellow Fred Reichheld has found that in the faceless online market, customers yearn for trustworthiness more than ever. Give it to them and they're yours forever, he says.
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December 2001 The Season's Best Reads For Work-Life Advice Represent a Broad View
The Wall Street Journal 12/19/2001
by Sue Shellenbarger
It has been a tough year to be an author on work-life topics. Recession and terrorist attacks so sharply altered the nation's priorities that books that seemed fresh in January were out-of-touch by year end. However, there are still some gems can still be found on bookstore shelves. One of Shellenbarger's favorites is "Loyalty Rules: How Today's Leaders Build Lasting Relationships", Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company. His central principle: Business is built on relationships with customers, employees and others. Fortifying those bonds, through principled leadership and decent treatment of people, is a good way to boost profit -- and improve workplace quality.
(subscription required)
In a downturn, manage for the upturn
Forethought 12/1/2001
by Crawford Gillies and Patrick Manning
There's mounting evidence that many UK business leaders are responding to economic slowdown with widespread cutbacks. Wrong move. In this article, the authors argue that the opposite approach works best. They point out that from 1990 and 1992 -- tough recessionary years in the UK -- over 10% of companies achieved total shareholder returns greater than 30%, far outstripping the market average of 9%. Managers at those growth companies kept their nerve and followed three disciplines: they acted swiftly to make necessary adjustments but avoided indiscrimate cost cutting; they strengthened the bonds of loyalty with employees, customers and other key partners; and they accelerated the search for growth opportunities.
November 2001Prescription for cutting costs
ebusinessforum.com 11/16/2001
by Frederick Reichheld
In the current downturn, most companies are tightening their belts. But too many are missing their biggest opportunity to contain costs: building loyal relationships with their best customers and with their own employees. In this article, loyalty expert Fred Reichheld explains that small increases in customer retention soon translate into big boosts to profits. And he gives powerful examples of companies whose fidelity to their workers pays off in better relationships with key customers. The author shares the four key steps that the "loyalty leaders" always take.
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Best Business Books of 2001
Soundview - Executive Book Summaries 11/1/2001
"Loyalty Rules!" by Frederick Reichheld and "Profit From the Core" by Chris Zook and James Allen have been chosen by Soundview's editors from among the over 1200 business books published each year.
October 2001 Making CRM Work
Bain Brief 10/30/2001
by Darrell Rigby and Fred Reichheld
Economic turbulence is forcing companies to sharpen their focus on customer loyalty. But a promising technique that emphases loyalty-building -- Customer Relationship Management programs, or CRM -- is falling flat. Bain's Darrell Rigby and Fred Reichheld offer insights on turning the promise of CRM into profits.
Prescription for Cutting Costs
Bain Brief 10/25/2001
by Fred Reichheld
In the current downturn, most companies are tightening their belts. But too many are missing their biggest opportunity to contain costs: building loyal relationships with their best customers and with their own employees. In this article, loyalty expert Fred Reichheld explains that small increases in customer retention soon translate into big boosts to profits. And he gives powerful examples of companies whose fidelity to their workers pays off in better relationships with key customers. The author shares the four key steps that the "loyalty leaders" always take.
Satisfaction: The False Path to Employee Loyalty
Harvard Management Update 10/5/2001
by Frederick F. Reichheld
Much has been made of the value of customer loyalty of late. Inundated by choices, customers need a compelling reason to stay with your product or service instead of embracing your competitor's offering. Happily, many CEOs have realized the relationship between this concept and employee loyalty. But what employers don't yet understand, asserts loyalty expert Frederick Reichheld, is how to cultivate employee loyalty rather than employee satisfaction. Reichheld explores the loyalty issue and reveals the key component for building this asset in your workforce teams.
Go to Harvard Management Update
September 2001Welch, Brockovich share stage
The Globe and Mail 9/26/2001
The fall business book season was scheduled to kick off in Manhattan at 11:00 a.m. on Sept. 11 -- two hours and 15 minutes after the first hijacked airliner slammed into the World Trade Center. Frederick Reichheld, a long-time Bain consultant, preaches one main principle -- loyalty -- and earlier this month followed up his insightful The Loyalty Effect with Loyalty Rules! (Harvard Business School), which provides practical advice on building lasting relationships with customers, employees, suppliers, and investors.
Careers Books
The Associated Press 9/24/2001
"Loyalty Rules!: How Today's Leaders Build Lasting Relationships" (Harvard Business School Press, $27.50 hardcover), by Frederick Reichheld, is another take on staffing, and how to stop what he calls "revolving-door defections." According to Reichheld, Bain & Company consultant, corporate America just doesn't get it: employee loyalty is crucial to economic success.
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