Business Insight Zone

A thought experiment:

What would you do if you could no longer use your main channel of communication to reach your customers?

• If you’re used to selling to them in person, could you do it over the phone in a pinch?
• If the phones in your call centers all went on the blink, would customers have any other way to get your attention? E-mail? IM? Twitter? Facebook?
• If you normally rely on drumming up business with mass advertisements in magazines or television, how would you replace those venues if, say, they became irrelevant?

(It’s with that last question that we leave the world of pure hypothesis and get right down into the messy kitchen of the consumer-goods companies and retailers. There’s water all over the floor.)

Why you should do this thought experiment:

It might help you think your way out of a cul-de-sac.

The easiest thing in the world is to keep doing what you’ve been doing . . . because it’s what you’ve been doing. To scrutinize your behaviors, especially the durable ones, is a hard thing to do. Which is why so many of us avoid it.

So make it safe. Pretend it’s just a thought experiment. Figure out what other channels you could use to put yourself “in harm’s way” with your customer — right out there where they couldn’t help but interact with you and give you their unvarnished opinion.

You might be surprised. You might find that your your emergency backup channel becomes a new express route into your customers’ lives.

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Photo by Lindsey T, used under a Creative Commons license.

Category: Customer service, Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Marketing & Sales