PlusOne - Musings of a marketer

I was reading this article the other day: Needed: A Better Buzzword Than Customersourcing and it strikes me that there is not enough user or consumer input for improvement of products or services in the business marketplace.

For many businesses, discovering methods to improve their bottom line may just be found on the other side of the counter - if only they would ask.

This discovery process could be as simple as a customer suggestion box on the counter, or a slightly more formalised process where customers are given a short questionnaire to complete (or the digital equivalent for web sites).

While many businesses do not believe they are in the area of product development, it can be worthwhile looking at new service development (service, in itself being a product). This development does not have to be especially complex - it could just be as simple as applying more focus to one aspect of your existing business and expanding what you do. Its often called value adding.

Customers can be a great source of inspiration, especially if they are indicating to you that they cannot get it (or are unhappy with what they get) elsewhere.

Quick entrepreneurs also jumping onto this need. Take the online business TechSay for example. What they do is get people who are in IT, or use computers or other IT devices in their daily working lives to complete questionnaires and then feed this information into IT development companies to give them a heads up on where perhaps they should be focusing their research and development. If you are computer user in your work, then it could be worth completing TechSay’s survey (yes they pay you do do it.)