Thanksgiving is the holiday where we take time to reflect and be thankful for the good things in our lives.
For business owners and other organization leaders, the Thanksgiving holiday is an excellent reminder to both remember and communicate with our most important people – employees and clients.
Perhaps, however, it can be helpful to be thankful to our competition. Whaaaat?! Well, think of it like this: Who teaches us valuable lessons every day on what we could have done, done better or perhaps not done that we wish we would have? That is a lot of permutations. Anyway, the answer is: our competition! If we are on the ball, we can learn a lot from them and for that I am thankful.
Perhaps an example will help. How do we communicate with our clients? Today, there are so many ways that a company can interact with their customers. Social media, email and even live chat. Have all these channels been established in your company and well-trained, responsive employees to handle such channels? Everyone has a social media account today and apparently some would rather tweet about their problem than email or call. Sometimes, customers need more information about a product and don’t want to waste their time on a call. From a Boomer perspective, who would want that?! Answer: a solid percentage of your clients. And, if we don’t watch out for our competitor’s adjustments (due to changing demographics, for example), innovations, efficiencies and attractive value proposition enhancements our business will suffer.
There is a lot we can learn from your competitors, but there is a lot that they can take away from you too…and they are watching. By learning lessons vicariously, we can attain a higher retention rate and higher margins…to name a few. Our opportunity is to learn from how they operate and pick and choose the best methods for our business – and perhaps improve on them in our own way.
