The North Carolina Public Transportation Association (NCPTA) hosts an annual training conference and business partner expo. It’s a time when vendors and systems collaborate to inform, update, collect new ideas and make the transit world a better place. The event offers possibilities for improving administration and operations, showcasing everything from scheduling software to vehicles of a surprising range of shapes and sizes.
My beloved daughter, and only child, turned 34 on October 9. Her birthday took me back to 1985 when I worked in telecom. Exciting times - expanding service from 13 cable channels, i.e. the networks, HBO, CNN, Nickelodeon, ESPN and C-SPAN to an unbelievable 400-450 MHZ bandwidth of up to 60 channels. Okay, so I’m dating myself (and loving it!).
One of the most embarrassing and gut-wrenching experiences for a Marketing Manager is to be handed a copy of company materials with the brand so disfigured it is unrecognizable.
Let’s face it, when your organization distributes print across the State, the country or the world, you need a system that gives you the power to: (1) Efficiently organize and update content, (2) Preserve brand integrity, (3) Manage and track usage and volume, (4) Avoid obsolescence and waste from unused stock, and (5) Ensure the polished image you designed remains intact, regardless the media.
In most businesses today, space comes at a premium. Desks are crammed together with co-workers close and the closet at the end of the hall is full of stuff. Add to that the jumble of materials needed to go to more than one trade show per year and you’ve got some serious space management issues. In fact, several of our print communication customers require us to call before we make any deliveries because they simply have no extra room.
In most businesses today, space comes at a premium. Desks are crammed together with co-workers close and the closet at the end of the hall is full of stuff. Add to that the jumble of materials needed to go to more than one trade show per year and you’ve got some serious space management issues. In fact, several of our print communication customers require us to call before we make any deliveries because they simply have no extra room.
Understanding the customer’s needs is critical to moving them through their customer journey in their relationship with you. Like any relationship, it's based on communication - a two-way conversation with your customer. Let's face it. We’re not very good at it. And that's because we aren’t that good at listening. Discovering their pain points, and challenges as well as communicating your ideas, or solutions requires not only hearing but actively listening to the customer.
A surprising thing happened during a recent brainstorming session I led for a retail client. We were supposed to be coming up with ideas for improving the company’s customer experiences, but the head of operations could not think of a single new customer service idea to explore. And the development leader failed to identify any new ideas for store layout or building features. And the merchandising vice president had difficulty understanding why “product” was one of the categories we were discussing.
