Every day, companies just like yours employ all kinds of strategies to increase efficiency. After all, efficiency improvements ultimately lead to greater profitability. What if you could use resources to enhance efficiency, productivity and, in the process, your bottom line? When you stop and think about it, you do have lots of great resources on your side - your team members, their ideas, time, money, etcetera. Could these resources be leveraged to your advantage? Absolutely.

Your Team - The Value of Training and Networking. You hired each and every member of your team because of the unique skill set he or she brings to the table. Having the right team in place is essential to your success. But, have you considered the benefits of enhancing their respective skills sets through advanced training? Improving an employee's skill set not only increases their efficiency on the job but improves morale which, in turn, can reduce turnover.

In addition to that skill set, what else do your employees bring to your company? They bring relationships! Many of the people within your organization have outside relationships - both professional and personal. Have you ever considered leveraging this wealth of knowledge to your advantage? Networking can be an invaluable resource. Are there other business people that your employees know that can help your company? Do those people know others that you want to know? You have to ask to find out. Sharing industry trends, business success stories and the like might just keep your company from reinventing the wheel.

Ideas - The Basis for Strategy. The knowledge, ideas and experience your employees have is sometimes referred to as intellectual capital. The combination of this intellectual capital, when used strategically, can enhance your business a great deal. Do you have a strategic plan in place?

Many companies today still operate at a tactical level. So if this describes your company, you are not alone by any means. For these businesses, the primary concerns are short term and reactive. It all boils down to getting the big order that came in last week, out on time.

New employees bring new skills and fresh perspectives to your every day challenges. If you want a new look on the old, ask the new employee about how they see ways to improve. Let's face it, the business environment is constantly changing and you need to change with it. Tap into the wealth of information at your fingertips and see what happens!

Money. What about capital expenditures? Do you know what your ROI (Return on Investment) really is for each of them? You have a responsibility to yourself and to your organization to gain the highest possible yield at all times. To do this, you must develop a system to monitor, measure and compare results. Evaluate the performance of your current capital activities with how they could be performing if deployed in a different way. Often, once the capital expenditure is made, it is forgotten. What can you do today to improve your return?

Etcetera, Etcetera, Etcetera - Marketing Your Business. Consider this. Your company has set aside a significant amount of money exclusively for marketing your business. One activity detailed in your plan is a direct mail campaign. In this scenario, the direct mail piece is a sales letter. Now, doesn't this cost you the same amount of time and money no matter what kind of response the letter generates? In other words, don't you still have the same amount of resources into the direct mail campaign regardless of whether it generates a 0.5 percent response rate, a 1 percent response rate, or better? What if you could devise a way to move that response rate from x to 2x?

What if you could move your customers who buy your product or service once per year to buy twice per year? What if you could sell them a complementary product or service? What if you could get your current clients to refer new ones? What if you investigate when you fail to make an expected sale to see what you might do better? Have you considered calling on lost prospects to see if their needs have changed? Suffice it to say, there are many ways to maximize marketing efforts that have either taken place or that fall into your current customer communications.

What if? It's a good question to ask in many areas of your business. Reconsider doing things because they have always been done that way. Maximize your resources to yield the best possible result!

We can work with you to spot great opportunities that can have a dramatic impact on your company. Give us a call today!