2009 has been a learning experience, to put it mildly.

I have spoken to countless business owners across a range of industries about 2009 . Most people have indicated it was the worst year in their entire business careers. Industries are down on average 20-25%, bankruptcies and mergers abounded and I had to catch my breath when an industry colleague told me that his business was down 50% in 2009 …. 50%! 

All of this has given me pause to consider what we have learned in 2009 and how this will impact our business landscape in 2010. I have distilled this down to 3 thoughts.

 1. It’s not about the product, it’s about the process

The way companies have ordered promotional products has not changed much over the years. Most organizations place their orders through a promotional distributor who is responsible for the ideation and ultimate production of the order. I think this is an outdated process, one that will be replaced by more sophisticated web based processes that allow companies to procure their merchandise via simple to use order management systems. As a result of what technology enables, this will be available to companies of all sizes, not just the multi-million dollar programs.

Let me give an example. We were approached by an organization looking for a second opinion on their merchandise program. They had been working with an incumbent distributor who was doing a nice job in terms of ideas and execution. However, the organization’s real challenge was inventory risk and being stuck with product if it did not sell. We honed in on that specific challenge and offered our online retail store which collects orders across the entire organization and then produces the goods just in time, thereby eliminating the inventory risk. The product became secondary, shifting the focus to how the process could help solve their business challenges.

2. Social media is now mainstream

@techfanster tweeted the following which sums up exactly where we are in the social media space as of late 2009

If I hear “social media expert” once more I’m going to scream. Congrats on having twitter AND facebook… so does my mom. Really.

Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, etc are still enjoying the spotlight. Users have set up accounts in droves, web 2.0 conferences abound and “experts” have come out of the woodwork to educate the masses. People listened and started experimenting in a big way in 2009.

So, now what?

I see 2010 as being the year where we will see the true divide, specifically between the people who use these tools effectively to develop a strong community of friends, fans and customers vs the bandwagon jumpers who setup a Twitter profile only to spam people with product specials. My friend Bobby Lehew wrote a fabulous post about this very point, highlighting the difference between “social networking and social netbeing”. In the post, he suggests that having a social media presence takes a lot of work, just like networking in real life does. It’s just as hard to fake it online as it is in real life.

3. Differentiate or die.

The promotional industry shrunk by 20% in 2009 as buyers across North America scrutinized their budgets. Questions ranged from “do we really need to give polo shirts for this year’s tournament” to “are we spending our budget in the most efficient way possible?”

I believe that companies will be able to grow in 2010 by truly differentiating themselves from the competition. Focusing on a specific market segment, developing a proprietary technology, becoming the expert in a specific product category are all ways to accomplish this vs being the “I can get you anything” product generalist. As they say, “jack of all trades, master of none.”

Regardless of whether any of these predictions prove to be true, 2010 is certainly going to be an interesting year.

Please feel free to post your predictions for 2010 – I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Tags: 2010, rightsleeve, rightsleeve.com

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 3rd, 2010 at 9:50 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.