IDG Contributor Network: What makes – and keeps – your company relevant?

When was the last time you answered these three questions from the perspective of your client or customer: Why you? Why now? What makes you relevant?

Better yet, when was the last time that you asked them for their candid feedback?

It’s important to ask on a regular basis because your customers are doing so every day.

Admittedly, people and companies that sell technology products and services go through this exercise more often. They are always trying to define and refine their Unique Selling Proposition (USP).

Understanding your relevance is limited to external customers, however. Your internal customers are asking. A client in a large government agency once called to tell me that 30 percent of his department was being laid off and the internal support service they provided was being outsourced. As he lamented the loss he said, “The change is ultimately a good decision. The sad part is that we could have done all of them ourselves. We just didn’t look at it from our customers’ perspective.”

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