A lot of companies and foundations have difficulty in dealing with the new demands of customers, the new techniques to manage relationships and to cultivate them to become potential customers.
Marketing campaigns using a traditional approach are costing more, and with less result.
But there is good news, in history entrepreneurs have been able to make the transition when faced with bad sales and lower profit margins. In earlier times it was the CEO that decided when it was time to change, but companies (including foundations) would do well to engage their employees and customers early on in this process.
Why decide which path to take when faced with bad sales, its always wiser to include many others in this decision and to learn from competitors and start ups in which approach, business models, marketing & communication channels they use and how they manage them.
Your employees and customers are your most valuable asset, and if asked and included in decisions this value will translate into excellent results and more importantly you are investing in the resiliency of your business.
Also take into account that financing now a days is not just a matter of the banks, which in practice have no innovative impact and only lend what you have already gained in assets.
These assets and your prospects and innovative portfolio are of interest to informal investors, crowdfunding communities and more. Banks will join in a later stage when the first investments have already been made and results can be shown.
Many examples that show businesses & foundations the path to take can be shared, so we hope that CEO' s and employees will collaborate in navigating through these troubled but soon to be very clear waters.
We are very inspired by the 'connect and develop' program of Procter & Gamble started in 2005 and that created a prediction market for P & G and reached out to engineers all over the world to share their ideas and innovations with them, and to collaborate on getting them to market. P & G embrace of crowdsourcing has been the envy of many CEO.
Let go of what you know, embrace your insecurities and allow others to participate, you will be rewarded.
Make it Happen.