Technology as a Business Strategy
April 24, 2008
When you think of business strategy, you think competitive advantage, or pricing, or promotion. But what if Technology could actually give you an advantage in growing your business?
When we talk with business owners/presidents/leaders, we ask the very simple question:
“Based on what you want to accomplish over the next few years, what are some of the strategies you will engage in to get to that vision.”
What we are looking for is how technology can actually help quicken the process from your Current Reality to your Future Reality.
One company we know told us their vision was to be the largest producer of their product in the state. In order to get there, they had to invest in infrastructure so they could grow quickly.
Fortunately for them, there were distinct advantages that technology could bring them–one of which actually helped them bring more customers - which was part of their goal.
Your business strategy can include many things–but technology just might be something that can touch other elements of strategy. Thus, it makes your path to your vision quicker and more efficient. G3 is committed to understanding what’s most important to your business and takes a future oriented approach to reaching your objectives. The bridge below helps illustrate this ideology.
Of course your objectives may differ from those in the model and that is where we can help. G3 adapts to your situation to provide you with the most ideal technology solution to realize your vision effectively.
Discovering Opportunities to Drive Competitive Edge
April 2, 2008
We caught up with Lisa Hill last week. Lisa is our VP Sales and is quite involved in helping clients identify the major issues they’re trying to solve with technology solutions.
Lisa and her team have a unique way of handling customer meetings and the sales process itself. We thought you’d like to hear it in her words. This may help you know what to expect when you ask G3 in to discuss your goals and issues.
Our Project Managers Begin With One Question. Wonder What It Is?
March 31, 2008
You know, selling technology is the easy part. We believe that if you have business problems to solve, then we can create meaningful solutions for you, in and around technology.
But Project Management–now that’s a different deal.
Do you know how many moving pieces there are to a technology implementation? Thousands. And if all of that doesn’t come together properly, then costs go up, frustration mounts, and implementation plans go out the window.
So our Project Managers (PM’s) begin every project with the very simple but important question: Why did you buy this? (Or, what are you hoping this solution will do for you?) By knowing that, it restates the value you put on the solution–and helps us make sure we fulfill your expectations.
Are we saying nothing ever goes wrong with our implementation? Of course not.
Not sure we’ve ever had a perfect one. But one thing we can say is that we keep you updated all along the curve to make sure you know where we are in the process. Communication is vital. And it’s a promise we make to you.
So if you’re just beginning a project with us and you hear your PM ask that question “why did you buy this?” don’t take offense. They’re just making sure there is complete understanding prior to beginning work. It can save headaches later.
The G3 Value Commitment
March 27, 2008
I was on a sales call the other day and the customer asked me a poignant question: “What makes you different from all of the other tech vendors that call on me.”
I’m not sure I answered it to his satisfaction, but I came back to the office and jotted down what my belief is about the value we bring customers.
I like to divide our value into three areas: Productivity, Cost Reduction, and Market Advantage.
Now, these three things can take on many looks but I don’t think selling technology should be about the technology. It should be about WHAT THE TECHNOLOGY CAN DO for your business.
That’s it.
Anyone who calls on you — and all they can talk about is the coolness of the latest technology is doing you no service at all.
That said, we’ve learned a lot in 37 years in business serving over 2500 customers–and here are some of our beliefs:
- We believe —that every technology solution MUST address core business issues. In fact, we won’t even make a recommendation unless it improves your business—financially or otherwise. (These improvement might come through things like better customer retention, better customer satisfaction, better customer service, or increasing revenue/decreasing costs.)
- Our second belief is that … success is about process. We have built a Proven Process that helps you and us determine exactly what those core business issues are—and whether there are technology solutions for those issues. We find that over 80% of the solutions we implement come from problems the client didn’t know they had—or didn’t know there were solutions for. I will share more about that process in later posts.
- Thirdly, the partner you choose must be have a WORLD VIEW that has at it’s core —helping you solve problems. We find most companies have as their CORE INTENT to sell products and platforms. And while that’s OK, it doesn’t always speak to your business issues—and G3 takes a very different view—-our intent is to solve problems given your business landscape— and given our knowledge of the solutions. An often overlooked portion of this is implementation, programming and support. Things WILL change in the future — you want to make sure you have a support system that can change with you.
I hope this helps you understand the commitment and belief we have in this world of technology. We take our process seriously–mainly because we want you to be amazed at the power technology has in helping you grow your business.
In a related post, Darren Marie does a brief audio interview about how to get ready for technology.
How to Create Value: Process, Product, or Both?
March 21, 2008
Well, to be honest, we get a lot of questions upfront: Are you going to blow me away with technology terms? Or, try to sell me something that I’ll never understand how to use? Or, sell me more than I need?
Those are good questions. (It sounds like you’ve bought technology before.) Well, we do things differently here, and our philosophy is that we don’t aim to sell any particular product like others do. We actually care about the product only to the extent that its solves your problems.
Here is Our Thinking:
We want to provide the optimum value when you get your new system installed, whatever it might look like. In the past, when we haven’t done our due diligence — to find out exactly what you need — we realized down the road that there were things that were left out. That isn’t good for anyone. Consequently, the G3 Process is a vital part of our value to you.
Explore Your Business
First, we Explore your business. We ask you questions about your direction, your strategy, your technology initiatives and other important items. Then, we tell you a little about how our best customers are using technology to solve business problems.
Deeper Diagnosis
Next, we go into a Deeper Diagnosis of the issues and goals you have. If technology isn’t solving a business problem, then we won’t recommend it. You may meet some other people from G3 at this point. And you might bring in more of your people to make sure we have input in all areas before we recommend anything.
We used to witness the “One Purchaser” phenomena where one person would buy technology then no one would use it because they were never consulted. That’s a mistake we won’t let you make.
Recommendation
Then, we come back with our Recommendation. That way, we are recommending solutions that fit the business goals and objectives that we discovered in the Exploration phase.
You might think this is overkill - too long of a process - but technology has taken on such an important part of a company’s competitive strategy that we would be doing you a disservice if we didn’t pay attention to the long term vision.
And, we don’t want to get that phone call from you in six months where you say, “Hey, why didn’t you tell me you did this? If I’d have known that…” well you know the rest.
If you want to speak with one of our specialists, call us at 317.872.8888 and we’ll be glad to walk you through our process in more detail.