¿Donde Estas?

¿Donde Estas? Wo Bist Du? uh Where are you?

Do you where you are? Do you know where your customers are? Do you know?

There seems to be a popular misconception as to where people are? The truth dear reader is rather simple. As you read this blog, I am no more than a few feet from you. This happy medium known as the Internet has made the miles disappear. Think about it, I sit here in Deep South Texas and with a few clicks of the mouse, I know what the temperature is in Tahlequah, Oklahoma is. A couple of other clicks and I can see out my friend's apartment in Berlin, Germany through his web-cam.

The transfer of information has quickly become such an "old-hand" that I can read the weekly bulletin of the Church my In-Laws attend in Memphis, Tennessee. With blogs, emotions are now shared worldwide, in an instant. I can feel your pain, I can share in your happiness.

So what does this have to do with business matters? Issues in your neighborhood affect me as do the issues in my neighborhood affect you. This means that for as much as we have to think globally we also have to start thinking locally, think about the customer's location in terms of "that you have to know what is going on in that community."

As an example, few months ago I received a call from a non-profit organization in Connecticut. It seems that they were looking for a custom database designer. It got me thinking "why are they calling Texas for a database designer?" Simple, either they were burned by someone locally or no one advertised on the Internet that they offered those services. Needless to say I did the work. To this day, I continue to read their local paper, online of course. I also subscribe to the organization's newsletter. I am now part of their community...Passively Observing but sharing thoughts and ideas with the customer whenever we talk, "Hey, how is that Highway expansion going?" or "Did that School Bond pass at the last vote?" and so on.

As the Internet continues to evolve, it is up to you to spread your wings across the Internet and get in touch with not only your customer and their individual needs but establish a solid foundation and know what is going on in their neck of the woods.