I hate to say this, but Google has made us all a bit lazy--not to mention fatter from sitting for hours in front of our computer screens.  It's just too easy to search for what we want without moving more than our fingertips, but that deeply ingrained habit has negative ramifications for what we do as entrepreneurs.  There is no substitute for getting out of the office and talking face to face with customers, suppliers, distributors, and anyone else who affects the success of your business.  Google is great for doing your background research, for finding people and businesses, and for generally seeing what's out there.  In fact, I highly recommend that you identify the key words that describe your business and enter them into a Google search.  You will no doubt be stunned at what you find, including sites that are leveraging what your company has done for their own purposes, and sometimes those purposes are not compatible with the image you want your company to project.  Need I say more.

You can get the beginnings of a sense of your market and your competitors by Googling them, but you don't really know your customers and competitors until you've spent some quality  time with them face to face.  How do you identify new customer needs if you don't observe your customers in their natural habitat?  How do you learn how customers respond to competitors' products if you don't watch them interacting with those products?  And perhaps most importantly, how do you keep your customers coming back if they don't feel a personal connection to you? 

Aurora Paradise (no I didn't make that up) learned the importance of face-to-face time with her customers--hospitals, therapists, and retail store managers--when, according to Emily Maltby at The Wall Street  Journal,  they stopped buying her pain relief products back in January of this year.  Her company, Topical Biomedics is based in Rhineback NY but sells all over the U.S.  Ms. Paradise knew she had to take action right away to get those customers back.  She decided that she and her reps needed to hit the road and spend more time in the field with their customers; but, in the current economy, it just didn't make financial sense to travel by air.  A road trip seemed to be the solution. By hitting the road, they could visit all their customers in a particular region and save money at the same time.  Her reps really bought into the idea and took it even further, saving on hotel bills by creating a network of sleepover sites with family and friends.  Now, when the reps return to home base, they continue the customer face time with Skype and WebEx..  This very out-of-the-box solution to a problem that could have sunk the business taught Paradise an important lesson:  you never stop needing to visit your customers and put a personal touch on the business.

Try making face time work for your company by doing the following:

• If you're planning to launch a new business, get out and talk with customers and others in your industry to make sure you've designed your business to meet their needs.  Google isn't going to tell you that.
• Plan to visit your most important customers at least once a year at their business.  The focus should be on understanding what their needs are.  What problems are they facing? Google won't tell you that either.
• If you have retail stores, visit them unannounced once or twice a year and observe how your customers interact with your sales people and your products.
• Plan for creative ways to engage your customers face-to-face.  Free online video conferencing through Skype is compatible with any budget, so there's no excuse not to do it.
• Let your customers and suppliers  know when you'll be attending tradeshows and conventions.  They are great places to discover new opportunities and new ways to serve your customers.