To my followers, I apologize for being gone so long. A layoff, lots of interviews, more revisions of my resume than I care to think of, getting a new job, dealing with a deployment, and life in general have kept me away from the blogosphere. Forgive me. But I am back.
I have always wondered why it is, when I go to the grocery store with a handful of coupons that the store seems to not have half of the items that I have coupons for. I know that grocery stores can't stock everything, all grocery stores would be huge! But I find it frustrating that when I'm willing to purchase something new, or something I normally wouldn't purchase because I have a coupon. I would think that grocery stores have someone who is combing through the coupons each weekend to determine if certain products have to be better in stock. I would imagine that if there is a coupon for Lay's Potato Chips, that there is going to be a higher demand that week. If your customers want something, and you don't have, they are going to go somewhere else for it. Anticipating your customers wants can really play to your advantage. Look at printing photos and the difference in digital and film.
Even 10 years ago, if you wanted photos, you bought your film, took your pictures, brought the film into the store, waited two days, then got your photos back. Now, you take pictures and either upload them online or save them to your computer and never print them, have them sent out to snapfish.com, bring in your memory card and have them printed out quickly, or buy your own photo printer and print them at home. If you wanted to do film at home, you had to have a dark room. If stores that usually only did film didn't adapt, they would have gone out of business. Anticipation is important, whether it's groceries or photography. Know what they want before they have to ask for it.
Happy Marketing!
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