Beating the Sophomore SlumpDon't let a successful first year distract you from attracting new customers.

Q:How do I protect myself from income fluctuations? WhenI started my business, I had so many customers, I didn't havetime for marketing activities. But now I've gone into my"sophomore slump," and I'm struggling to get enoughbusiness. What's the balance between serving customers andgetting new ones?

A:You're fortunate to have started off with so muchbusiness. But it's important to focus on acquiring newcustomers, too. For many entrepreneurs, this means going tonetworking meetings, creating and maintaining a blog, making phonecalls, putting out a newsletter, and participating on listservs andin online forums.