Do Business Well

The abundance and sumptuousness of its food characterizes the Club Med vacation. Breakfast, for example, is a smorgasbord of fruit, all styles of eggs, pancakes, French toast, hot and cold cereals, and even steak and fish dishes. When vacationers first encounter this display, most sample as much of everything as they can. After a few days, however, most settle on a few favorites, blithely ignoring the rest. But don’t make the mistake of limiting their menu. What seduces the searchers is the liberating effect of choice. Actually availing themselves of the cornucopia comes second.

That reaction is typical of today’s searchers in any market. They want to consider the widest possible range of products, options, configurations, features, and alternatives, which is why astute market leaders offer them their competitors’ products in addition to their own. And even if you are the smallest company in the field, searchers expect you to provide the most extensive access to alternative sources of supply.

Searchers can actually help you do that. Cisco Systems, as we learned, consults with its search-and-browse customers, who are always scouting new ventures. Let’s suppose that a Cisco customer needs a certain piece of Internet hardware that is made by only three companies in the world: a three-man shop in Taiwan, a fifty-person factory in Silicon Valley, and a small team in Michigan. Not convinced that any of the three venues is appropriate, the customer talks to his or her Cisco sales representative. Therepresentative asks for a week to work on the situation. The next day Cisco puts up $1 billion to buy the Silicon Valley company. By the end of the allotted week, Cisco, which has by now acquired the company, can assure its customer that everything produced by the Silicon Valley company will work flawlessly. The customer’s problem is solved—and Cisco has one more line ofbusiness.

The automobile industry has also gotten the message. Buying a car today is not the experience it used to be. If you bought a car ten years ago, you probably initiated the process with a look at some reviews or a visit to a dealership. Today, your first stop is more likely to be a Web site devoted to cars, especially if you’re in search mode. Automakers such as Toyota and BMW thoroughly understand this. Toyota’s Web site invites side-by-side comparisons of its own models with competing ones from Ford, Nissan, Mitsubishi, or any other brand you may be considering. BMW’s site allows you to “build your own car” in any of a wide range of colors and configurations. It covers about any option you might want to explore, short of taking a virtual test drive. Even that possibility will be a reality in the not too distant future.

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