By the time you read this, some Denny’s restaurants will have been transformed from their normally sedate (translate: blah) interiors to jukebox diners featuring Mom’s old fashioned pot roast, beebop and neon. What’s with the 1950s re-image campaign? It’s a move to attract a younger crowd to the Grand Slam breakfast chain. As Denny’s president John Romandetti said of the company's changing image, “In order to stay relevant with today’s changing society, you really do have to refresh your image on some consistent basis or you become really irrelevant.”

Becoming “really irrelevant” to our markets would be self-destructive in today’s competitive business world. For a business owner to stay abreast of changing markets, trends and technology, and to stay relevant means flexing in what we do and how we do it. And that is a matter of survival.

What’s It Mean to Me?

How does the owner of a home-based business support service, a graphic or interior designer flex with his or her market? Small business owners have shifted a lot of gears over recent years to stay in business, expand their market and improve their financial “bottom line.” Changing the focus of a business – including the products and services offered and perhaps the method in which they are offered – can be trying and expensive. Most major shifts can be attributed to technological advances, which creates a completely new set of needs (for business owners and their clients) and different operating procedures.

There is a certain rhythm to answering the call of a changing world. One must listen, read, discuss, learn, search for options, make decisions, implement new procedures, products and equipment. An ongoing process, this dance becomes the true test of the entrepreneur, the business owner. Will you know when your clients want you to improve or expand your services? Will you be required to make a dramatic change in order to compete, attract new business and keep current clients? Will changing mean a new focus, expenditure or learning a new skill? The answer is probably Yes, to all of the above.

Can You Do The “Technology Dance”?

To flex with the market, remain competitive and increase your profits means staying in step with technology as it moves. That may mean a telephone system, a palmtop computer, a cellular phone or a software or Internet program that you must learn from ground up.

In 1980, Bobbie Kelly started a “word processing” business in Tulsa, Oklahoma. With money inherited from a loving aunt, she set her typewriter aside and purchased a XEROX 860 “word processor.” In today’s world, the 860 would be a dinosaur – a huge designed for the sole purpose of processing text. This gorgeous high-tech machine was a stand-alone unit (not a table top) that occupied a whole corner of Bobbie’s office.

Bobbie Kelly was working on the cutting edge of emerging technology. Few people knew what a “word processor” was. No one owned a personal computer. XEROX and IBM were making inroads into the corporate arena, where secretaries were learning how to process (type and manipulate) words on the 860 and the Displaywriter. Those visionary individuals and secretarial services who could afford to buy or lease the huge computers did so believing the technology would attract new clients with its promise of speed and large volume repetitive letters, thereby increasing their profits.

And so it did. Within five years, the personal computer replaced the dedicated word processing machine, and the rest is, as you know, herstory. Bobbie Kelly’s bet on the future paid off in the early ‘80s, but she, like others, flexed again, this time to embrace the PC. Since then, we’ve witnessed a stream of advancements in word processing and computers, not to mention the need to learn how to use all those wonderful new features. Who among us has not cringed at the thought of taking hours from our busy schedules to re-learn functions such as mail merge, outlining, and simpler functions we mastered long ago in now outdated software? Is it any wonder that some of us plant our feet and refuse to leave the “original” software – the one we learned first? Change is always difficult – it requires the dedication of time and attention. It may, however, be necessary.

The printing and graphic design industries are other examples of change necessitated by advancing technology. Designers who once created brochures and newsletters by cutting and pasting blocks of text and art onto layout boards now adjust those elements by moving a mouse and rearranging their work on a computer monitor’s screen. Many printing houses produce documents directly from digital files. Some designers have even moved beyond the printed page to custom-design web sites for their clients, developing more advanced skills.

As you serve your clients, ask yourself how you can improve your processes and what tools might serve you better. Then do the research and the due diligence to determine which new expenditures make sense and how and when you might fit them into your budget.

Can You Hear the Economy Speaking?

Is your bottom line saying, “I need help”? Being responsive financially takes discipline, and it’s another way to flex our business muscle.

In 1979, Pearl White started Confidante Keystrokes in Irvine, California. In the early 1990s, after fourteen years in business, economic recession hit Southern California and Pearl had some hard choices to make. “It was more important to upgrade my equipment and market my business than to throw (money) away on rent,” she says. Pearl moved her business to a home office, where she now enjoys greater flexibility in her schedule, which contributes to her continuing success.

Flexing according to our economic indicators is something businesses have always done. Large businesses sometimes take a lot longer to put these moves in place; and small business owners often procrastinate downsizing or strategizing new and better processes and products. Whether your company is big or little, keeping a close eye on your "economy" and moving accordingly in a timely, responsive manner could be a key to your success.

The Client Speaks

Are your clients asking for more than you can give them? A case in point is the small web site development firm whose clients are no longer satisfied with simply owning web sites. They now want to do “e-commerce” and sell their products on-line. The developer must learn new technology and respond to the clients’ needs or refer them elsewhere.

Since the 1980s, owners of what were once called “secretarial” services kept in step with 1) their clients’ demands, and 2) the technology that allows them to meet those demands. As business support service owners, they were challenged to create documents with a more sophisticated look – reflecting available technology – with bold headlines, charts and graphs, photos, tri-fold brochure format, and so forth. Not only did they adopt time-saving word processing systems, they became desktop publishers. They are perfect examples of adapting and flexing our skills and businesses. The challenge is to continue and to never stop flexing.

In the late 1990s, the management of Denny’s restaurants, after recovering from a bad image created by racial discrimination lawsuits, sat up and listened to its market before embarking on a move to re-image 1700 restaurants into a rockin’ 1950s theme. The concept will help Denny’s appeal to a younger set of consumers, who seem to like the faddish retro music and look.

“The worst reason to invest time, money, and energy into a business is because you are in love with the concept or the product or the activity,” says Jim Collison, founder of a statewide employers’ group in Iowa. Jim transformed a non-profit organization with great debt to a profitable for-profit company.

Better to invest time, money and energy into a business with processes and tools that better serve your clients' needs.

Can You Change the Way You Operate?

Evy Williams, owner of The Red Magnolia, an interior design firm in Fallbrook, California, says she changed the way she taught her clients about her products and services. In the late 1970s when she started her business, she bought furniture, rugs and accessories through design centers, which marked up their prices before selling to Evy. Evy recalls that, in her first year, "after expenses created by driving to showrooms and making long distance calls, I made around $30.”

Today, Evy is a stocking dealer who buys directly from manufacturers. “I’m able to keep my volume up, which helps me keep my manufacturers’ discounts, which I can pass on to my clients.” In addition, people can sit in a real sofa and run their fingers over its fabric, which makes the selection and decision-making process much more enjoyable and practical.

How can you maximize your profit without changing your services or products? Where can you save money? Perhaps it's as simple as signing up for a "frequent shopper" program at an office supply store or, if you travel by air a lot, an airline. Be a little greedy. Try to get more dollars into your bottom line profit every way you can.

Don’t Scrap the Business Plan, But . . .

A Chief Executive Officer of a large company told a group of business owners once that it “takes more guts than brains” to change one’s focus and move into a new business or market that you know very little about. Assuming you have a business plan, be willing to work new concepts into it. If you stick with your original business plan, there's a good chance your company will die on the vine. Business plans must be dynamic and flexible and modifiable according to business trends, customer needs and growth.

It takes a lot of chutzpa to drop services and products you’ve provided for your clients, especially when you know some of those people may decide to take their business elsewhere. But when you see that a part of your business is barely profitable, that it doesn’t help to bring in new business, that it’s a time-eating monster for which you are not adequately paid, you’ve got to find the gumption to make a change. Conversely, if there’s a service or product you’d like to offer, do your research and, when you’ve identified the potential users, seriously go for it. Is there more demand for the product than your profession or geographical area currently can supply? That’s a good indicator of a possible market.

Like many others, Pearl, of Confidante Keys, recognized a unique opportunity to expand her business and, in 1996, established a second company, A First Impression Resume Service. The company markets to the sales, management, and marketing professions at the executive level, providing a second revenue source and profit center. A wise move made possible because Pearl saw an opportunity and reached for it.

The key is to flex according to supply and demand. Protect what you have and be loyal to your business plan, but entertain all possibilities. It takes persistence, focus, determination and vision to move into uncharted waters.

Mingle With the Market

Knowing what people and companies need requires mingling with them. If the first word you associate with mingling is networking, don’t stop there. We’re talking about things like reading and going on-line as well as involving yourself in groups.

The Reading Hour. Periodicals like Home Office Computing, Entrepreneur, Working Woman, Fortune and Business 2.0, and major newspapers, provide valuable information about what our markets want and where they are headed. Get the inside scoop about booming industries – and those that are slumping. Read the profiles of companies and business leaders and reviews of software, hardware and business tools. Take an hour every Thursday morning or Sunday, keep your highlighter, pen and sticky notes handy, and enjoy the feast! Your reading hour will help you take the pulse of your market.

The Group Thing. Group participation is an excellent way to find out what the market is looking for while tapping potential markets. A member organization is the best place to begin, as members share their client experiences and what works and doesn’t work about the latest software. You may want to target professional groups like human resource managers, engineers, women in sales or women in management, where clients will be very specific about their needs. What better way to learn what business transformations are taking place than through a corporate client who is implementing new technology and has sophisticated requirements? Challenge yourself to stay in tune!

Roll With The Punches

Many are the stories of people who turned fledgling businesses into million dollar corporations. While people have been known to transcend adversity and make millions from molehills, most of us would be happy to have a modicum of success. But rarely has anyone succeeded without flexing with the market’s changing demands. While we may not re-image to a “hip-hop” 1950s theme, like Denny’s restaurants, by flexing with our markets, we will remain relevant and successful.

Originally published in Industry Focus for the Association of Business Support Services International, July 1999. Please do not reprint this article without attribution to Peggi Ridgway, author, and a link to www.Wordpix.com.