Happily create customers for keeps. If marketing is the art of creating a customer, smart marketing creates customers who want to stick around and who match the values and approach of the business owner or organization. Discover the assumptions and actions underpinning the ability to build a solid base of customers you enjoy doing business with. Drawing on her 30 years of business successes and mistakes, creative marketing expert Marcia Yudkin explains the principles that help entrepreneurs and companies attract a distinct set of buyers while maintaining the enthusiasm of both sides. According to Yudkin, author of "6 Steps to Free Publicity" and 14 other books, following formulas that worked for someone else doesn't guarantee a successful outcome for you. Instead, cultivate your own business philosophy, tone, persona and pace. Earn attention and loyalty by setting high standards and ignoring those who talk about business as a "numbers game." Discard myths standing in the way of your unique path to success. And cultivate patience, a marketing necessity. Know how to prevent and recover from a business famine, and develop staying power via a core group of supporters.
