2. Focus on the most critical rule of thumb for growth today—customer acquisition. Get as many quality customers—even light, occasional users—as quickly as possible. More customers mean more sales, share, and with that, conversion to loyal, heavy users. In addition, new customers have a key attribute that every marketer should leverage—word of mouth. Forrester Research concludes the most valuable customer today is the one that may buy little but whose blog postings, online product reviews, and favorable word of mouth gets 10, 50 or 1,000 others to buy. The longer people are with a brand, the less they talk about it, but new customers are more likely to recommend a brand to their family and friends.