Set customer loyalty goals

If you want to recharge your customers' batteries, you'll need a plan for doing so. Decide what you want to accomplish with increased customer loyalty.

I recommend: Service Quality Institute offers a full range of customer service training materials and solutions aimed at helping you develop more customers, more sales, loyal customers and employees devoted to making your customers happy.

Start small

Remember that customer service counts. Build loyalty effectively and inexpensively by answering your customers' questions, answering your business phone when it rings, and always saying hello and goodbye to your patrons.

I recommend: Learn the basics of good customer service at AllBusiness.com's "10 Rules for Great Customer Service."

Hire service-minded employees

Foster increased loyalty with a staff that is naturally helpful and friendly. Hire for personality rather than skills; you can't teach a positive attitude.

I recommend: Consider giving potential hires a personality test to make sure they're customer-service material. Profiles International and Brainbench sell pre-employment tests for job candidates while PsychTest.com offers a free Customer Service Job Fit Test to help employees evaluate their own customer service skills.

Survey your customers

If you want to know how to grow your base of loyal customers, ask your current ones.

I recommend: Are your customers satisfied with your store? Give frequent customers a short questionnaire, similar to the sample Customer Satisfaction Survey from Survey Galaxy, to find out.

Respond to complaints

Customer complaints aren't business failures; instead, they're business opportunities. If you address and resolve conflicts promptly, the appreciative customer is in many cases more likely to be loyal than a customer who never had a complaint.

I recommend: Keep track of customer complaints with Entrepreneur.com's customer service form, which makes monitoring and responding to customer requests easy.

Increase communications

Constant communication with customers is necessary in building loyal relationships. Send regular mailings and e-mails announcing new merchandise, special discounts and exclusive sales.

I recommend: Supplement business communications with thank-you notes and birthday cards to give your customer relationships a personal dimension that's sure to inspire loyalty. Send professional e-cards with a CorpNote membership or for free at Blue Mountain. Prefer paper? Order business-themed greeting cards from CardsDirect.