You must, I assume have heard it before? Well if not, here it goes again: The Internet is here to stay!
This has been said so many times before and with each high profile failure or success in the IT industry, it will I am certain, be said, quoted or headlined again.
It is no longer news; companies have grown tired of hearing about failed enterprises and some have put aside the idea of the many millions to be made in the Dotcom endeavour.
What then is to happen with this thing called the Internet, well have you not heard? It is hear to stay!
There are many functions in our every day life that are fulfilled through the use of electronic medium, functions, which we now take for granted. The ATM for instance; who would have thought we would barely be able to function without a hole in the wall from which we can draw cash, get statements, transfer money and pay accounts. How the route we take to meet with friends or the shops we frequent, is altered by the convenience of where we can use an ATM, and the reasons for the detour; well, safety, efficiency, and convenience to name but a few.
Will we be able to extract the same advantages out of using the Internet?
In the same way we have warmed to using the unattended convenience of an ATM, we will very shortly find that the Internet is very able to service our growing hunger for knowledge and convenience. The Internet is a fragment of the technology that is alive and well, and whether or not it effects your immediate environment directly, you can be assured it affects you indirectly. The Internet is a form of technology that allows us to take advantage of a tremendous amount of information that would otherwise be lost. Not in the traditional sense of where we put it, but rather in a sense that there is so much information. By the time we have muddled through everything to find what it is we are looking for, we would not need it any more.
Wow! What a great tool, and that is how you should see it.
So how does this great tool affect me in my humble and so completely unrelated business environment? Good question! It`s the technology that we are interested in here, not the Internet. That comes later. If you are further down the track then that comes now. So first ask yourself. How far am I down the track? Have I considered any type of future plan as far as technology goes? How, in the technology driven world, is my business going to be affected and how will I make my business more profitable in the future.
If you have asked yourself these questions already, then you are half way there. You see there is no separation from the way your business should be run to how it is affected by the technology you use. They should be one and the same.
What is it that you do in your business?
* Make a product/service
* Market a product/service
* Sell a product/service
* Deliver it
* Retain customers
How do you do this in the electronic environment?
First you must concede that you cannot separate the way you run your business from the way technology is going to affect it.
What if you knew all there was to know about your customers? What if you could then use that information to sell them something you had not thought they wanted or did not think they needed? If you have a process that is able to capture this information and a system that delivers it to the correct person, department or organisation then this is possible.
The process will vary from company to company. What you have to ask yourself is, in what way do I communicate with my customers? Do you assume that because of popular sentiment you are servicing all of your customers needs? Are there open channels of communication with them?
Wow, all these questions and not very many answers. Yes very true and to this I pose yet another question. Are you interested in changing the way you communicate with your customers?
If not, then those that do will undoubtedly have the advantage and will know what their clients and customers need in order to provide them with what they want. If you can give somebody what they need, by knowing what they want, then you are servicing them in the way of the future.
The future is a market place where the customer is the focus and not the products, where information and the availability of it is paramount to giving people the power to make an informed decision.
An open channel of communication throughout all areas of a company`s organisational structure is the starting point to servicing clients and is the only way that your business will be profitable in the future.
Uovo`s turn-key market offering is precisely this. Helping you achieve effective communication with your staff, clients and customers using Internet related technologies and the Internet.
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