Look for new opportunities. Today, we’re all struggling in our businesses to survive the economic downturn but also to look for trends and changes in our respective businesses so that when the recession is over, you’re better positioned to grow and build your business than if you remain static. As difficult as the operating environment is for everyone right now, it’s a great time to find those niches and opportunities for growth.
There are a lot of different ways to do that depending on your business. For a number of them, we can all take a bunker mentality, where we stay inside our company and just hold down the fort until the recession or the storm is over. Instead, it’s a great opportunity to go out and prospect for new business, to consider new products and new lines of business, and do some thoughtful kind of strategic planning, even though everybody’s business is down because, at some point, the market will turn, and you want to look for those opportunities to expand your business and grow your revenue. Now’s a good time to do that while business may be slow.
Some of that is just brainstorming and market intelligence. What are people seeing in the market? What are your prospective customers asking you for? What are they struggling with in their businesses? If we can solve what they’re struggling with, what would that look like? What products and services do we need to create that would help small-business people in particular with the things they’re struggling with?
It’s really spending a lot of time in their offices or their plants — whatever the case may be — learning what challenges they have in their businesses, and in doing that, you have to truly understand their business and spend a lot of time in their shop. If you do that and you bring that knowledge back, then you can better equip your business to again figure out the products and services that that customer needs. You’ve got to go on-site and walk and learn the business. You want to learn about their customers and what their customers are looking for right now, what kinds of things they’re having to do to satisfy their customers — is it a slightly different product? Slightly less expensive product? What adjustments are they having to make and what things are they struggling with?
Prioritize the ones that keep coming up the most reoccurring and the loudest, and focus on those the fastest so we can have more positive impact to our customer. It’s like anything else, to get the feedback and synthesize it and prioritize it, turn it into a product or service and get it back out to those customers as quick as you can.
How to reach: Midtown Bank & Trust Co., (404) 969-4400 or www.midtownbank.biz