thinking/critical

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Distilling customer relationship publishing into one simple blog post
 
 

I read dozens of business books and articles every month, and I look for common threads between them. Not surprisingly, I find more common thought than innovative or divergent thought in business theory. In general that’s good, because it means that ideas are being tested for practical [...]

People are getting all wrapped up in social media, thinking social media is the point. Social media is just a delivery device – a delivery device that any junior high school student can master. Marketing is the point, and content is the requirement.

The biggest danger to a business owner is lack of originality – generally demonstrated by virtue of getting trapped in his or her industry’s trends. Industry trend following simply turns your business into a commodity business. Avoid the trap, and maintain your margins.

In the 1960s Marshall McLuhan – the modern media world’s most prescient cultural forecaster – said “we are always living way ahead of our thinking.” This article examines how that truth influences most business failure to successfully market products to customers.

Without the support of wild growth based on expansion, we must return to offering things of inherent, comparative value. Relationships are once again essential to business success. Relationships within the business, and relationships with the customers, vendors, and communities the business depends on. But has our understanding of relationship become superficial?

Here’s why. Database analysis to study customers is a lot like looking at the animals in the zoo. Don’t get me wrong – you can learn a lot. But it’s an observation, not an experience. How the heck did we get to the point where the word intimacy, which means a close association or connection, of or relating to inner character or essential nature (according to Webster’s unabridged) – how did we start applying that word to a business concept that most people interpret to mean “figure out what your customers buy, when they buy it, how they buy it, and why they buy it – and use that information to sell them more of it” ?

No, I don’t believe innovation is unimportant. I do think the word is over-used, and I think people would rather attend expensive seminars in San Francisco to learn about it than actually engage in it. But I think it’s important. I also think it is woefully misunderstood. And I think the primary reason for our ongoing misunderstanding is our failure to recognize the importance of relevance.