In business, there is no “Field of Dreams”

Remember the line in this movie, “If you build it, they will come”?  No they won’t!! 

Waiting for your prey to come to you doesn’t work in the jungle.  I just watched a couple of hours of “Earth, The Documentary”.  Lions, birds, whatever, operate in a proactive fashion in order to survive, just as we do. 

How do you grow sales in a business environment that strips even the most venerable companies of their business models and their very reason for being?  How do you grow with economies so global that local stores are harmed by events that take place half a world away?  How do you speak to a country where groups we used to call minorities now often make up majorities with distinct interests and cultures?  (see the young millennials)  Businesses crumble because they cling to business as usual approaches and they don’t wake up in time to adapt.  Why?

1. Success distracts them.

2. They don’t have a ‘change or die’ mentality and sense of urgency.

3. They aren’t constantly anticipating their customer's current and
future needs.

We can all fool ourselves thinking we have the best offering; competition is weak; things will come back; we can sell to a shrinking market and make quality strides and be beaten by the advent of some new, innovative approach.

Markets move on fast.  At a meeting in Chicago last week, I noticed that there were about 3 I-PADS at every table and the person with the IPAD2 was attracting a lot of visitors.  Who would have ‘thunk’ it!  No clunky PC’s… I-PADS.  What did Apple do…I-POD (70% share) to I-Phone to I-PAD.  A complete desire to change and innovate.

At that same meeting a large group were working on how to refresh their business, their ‘offering’, story, sense of urgency in their sales process, their sense of what their targeted customers want, their sales skills.  They have a chance at being adaptive.

You and I must heighten our awareness everyday.  What do we see?  What are the main desires in our business – now?  Even after we do an analysis of what is going on in our industry, competition and customers, there is a good chance we won’t change.  Well, unless your desires are prioritized and re-stated, and you adjust all your systems to match up with those priorities.  No transition will be possible unless you examine your present systems and eliminate those that won’t pull you to where you need to go and create the ones who will.  You can’t believe your own press releases.  Cause the tension between what your analysis tells you (your new stated desires) and your actual reality.

Cause the tension but don’t change who you are….just how you see things

But adapting is not just about new technologies or change for the sake of change.  That can be more perilous for business than not adapting at all.  It can make you forget who you are, what you stand for and destroy your value proposition.  It could cause you to ignore all the tools you already have to sell your product or make your existing customers special.

In summary, we have to  reach our customers on the most personal level and create plans to build a bigger, more refreshed business, or we will be waiting for our prey and they won’t be showing up.  And our businesses will be drying up.

Take a few minutes and stand up and be willing to admit that there are things you do not know, that others may know and you need to know.

And answer the question, Are you still relevant today?  What might be changing?  What can you do to confront the realities of reaching today’s customers?  Are there other ways to solve the customer’s problems, to provide the value you deliver?  Are you adapting and bringing new products and/or services to market faster?

Have a meeting with some associates who share your commitment to adapt and answer these questions… and get adapting!

Have a great week!