How to Benefit from the Customer-Made Trend

Of all the multitudinous messages in my email

each month, there is the rubbish and there is the gold. One of the

golden messages is always the Trendwatching ezine.

The May edition, which focuses on the ‘Customer-Made’ trend, is no exception. ‘Customer-Made’ is summed up as follows: the

produced, manufactured, developed, designed, serviced, or processed.

The

issue is worth reading just for the examples. Warning: you should not

have anything else more urgent to do for the next 20 minutes or more.

Make sure you don’t miss the customer-made Nike ad with the footage of

Tiger Woods: even if, like me, you’re not a golfer, it’s a transcendent

moment.

Yes, a subscription to Trendwatching is free.

The

examples given are very corporate – Nike etc. But the logic is

essentially the same for solopreneurs and other small businesses

interested in the idea of engaging customers in the development and

improvement of products and services.

For example, if you provide training services, what about putting on

a free seminar where you exchange some great ideas and training

techniques in exchange for a brainstorming session about ways you can

improve what you offer? Some providers of services may find this a bit

threatening (very threatening?) so maybe they need to find another way.

But those who have confidence in their services and have quality

customers will see a great opportunity to stretch and also to have a

product which will almost certainly be more attractive to customers and

prospects.

The report also touches, lightly, on the significant issue of intellectual

property rights for products developed by customers or with customer

input along the lines covered by the report.