The manufacturing industry is fraught with competition. Everyone’s looking for ways to become more efficient, more profitable, and more known. With the daily influx of technological advancements, manufacturers are locked in a rat race to optimize their operations and increase their profit margins.
Where your company stands in that race depends on your ability to adapt with the times and find opportunities to expand your customer base. Every manufacturer wants to grow, but the issue is how to go about it. Continue reading to learn what tools every manufacturing company should consider implementing.
Customer Feedback
Every manufacturing company should make it their primary goal to become a customer-centric organization. No market research plan is complete without input from the people who have the biggest impact on your company’s success. That’s why, as technology advances, the customer experience continues to rival quality products for eminence.
Before you make any adjustments to your company’s products, services, or operations, you need to consult your customers. They may not be industry experts, but they are the industry. Being a customer-centric company is all about going the extra mile to enhance customer experience, and few things feel better to customers than seeing their suggestions implemented by their favorite brands.
The best way to get actionable feedback is with voice-of-the-customer (VoC) software like Alchemer. Their software helps you find your target audience, get implementable insights, create a workflow for implementation, and maintain contact with customers to keep them engaged. To learn more about how Alchemer’s VoC software can help your company take transformative action, visit alchemer.com.
Enhanced Physical Security
As important as it is to become a customer-centric organization, it’s also equally important to secure all your company’s assets, from data to personnel and equipment. You may not see security as a major concern if you’re new to the manufacturing industry, but all it takes is one breach to destroy everything you’ve worked to build.
Keeping your facilities and enterprise infrastructure systems secure is all about keeping up with the times. You need to update your surveillance system if you haven’t done so in recent years. One of the major trends in surveillance is the use of cloud technology. With a combination of cloud and DVR technology, you can monitor your systems remotely using your smartphone or any other connected computer.
However, don’t get so hi-tech that you forget simple things that could make your facilities more secure. For one, adding fire-rated steel doors to replace your current ones give you peace of mind that you have doors capable of stopping intruders and containing flames.
Enhanced Cybersecurity
While you’re considering taking your surveillance system to the cloud, you should also enhance your cybersecurity system. Cybercrime is a multi-billion dollar industry, and you’re naive if you don’t think hackers would love to take a bite out of your company as well.
Data breaches are one of the main threats companies face today. One of the best ways to combat unwanted presences in your network is to get your own IPv4 or IPv6 address. Having your own IP address is akin to having your own safe space on the internet where you have full control over what information flows in and out of your network.
It would be best if you also considered bolstering your cybersecurity infrastructure by fortifying it with anti-ransomware. Holding servers and databases for ransom is one of the fastest-growing cybercrimes in the United States. If a hacker steals your or your customers’ data and uses it to extract a ransom payment from you, your whole company will be at the mercy of pirates. It will cost you more than dollars and data—it will also cost you the trust of consumers.
As you can see, modernization is the overriding theme when it comes to ways to enhance your business. Modernizing your manufacturing business needs to be a three-pronged effort focused on implementing customer feedback to enhance the user experience and securing your data and facilities.
