SINCE THE ECONOMY went south, instore has continually given the same instructions: Don’t worry about the economy. Keep moving forward. Keep getting better.
Now that things are maybe, possibly, finally beginning to improve, we want to reiterate the same advice one more time. Don’t forget to keep doing the extra work that will make your store stronger.
This month, our extra-credit assignment is for you to take advantage of new technology. There are so many technologies out there that are now easier to use than ever, and that with a reasonably small investment of time can significantly help your store. Pick one of the below and make it your special personal project for the next month, something you work in between other projects or when you have a day off.
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- Learn to edit video and create a fun store tour or instant video promotions.
- Learn to record and manipulate audio to create a store podcast or radio commercial.
- Practice social networking with Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace.
- Learn to operate your website’s back-end so you can upload a new picture to the front page of your website.
- Learn light HTML editing — just enough so you could make an immediate correction on your website if you had to.
- Learn how to create a wiki, then build an internal one for your store so you can accumulate information on operations, policies and "secret" sales techniques.
- Learn to shop diamond suppliers online.
My guess is that you’ll really enjoy the challenge.
Wishing you the very best business …
David Squires
dsquires@instoremag.com