For a long time, the dowdy and somewhat overlooked sister to the rather more glamorous new business sale; the development of existing customers—or account management as it's generally known—has suddenly become rather more attractive. With new business opportunities harder to come by for many companies selling business to business, and with increased competition driving down margins, many firms are finding their existing customers are the "cash in the attic" they need to take them through the current down turn.
 
For a few businesses, like funeral homes perhaps, the scope for repeat business might be a little limited, but for most there's potential to either sell more of what customers have already, or add other products and services. Selling more to your existing customers has a number of virtues: as an established supplier, sales cycles are generally shorter, competitive pressures are less and margins are higher. Which is why, as independent CRM consultants, we're seeing sharp growth in companies looking to be more systematic in maximizing customer potential and using CRM technology to support it. The following are some of the simple ways firms are doing it:
 
Read the entire CustomerThink article.