Carrie Hensel: Understanding your client

Carrie Hensel runs a web design and development firm in Ann Arbor Michigan with her partner, Catherine Hayes. Their firm has clients nationwide. In this segment, we discuss how Inner Circle stays close to the customer to gain their competitive edge and makes sales against large and small competitors alike.

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In this 14 minute segment (download iPod compatible, 70MB), Carrie Hensel and I discuss how her web design and development firm, Inner Circle Media, competes effectively against large competitors. Carrie starts by arraying the range of jobs Inner Circle takes on, from externally facing sites to internally facing sites for tracking billable hours and medical procedures. When I pressed Carrie for how she manages to beat large firms, she laid out the following interesting scenario that echoes recent criticisms of enterprise solutions:

Similarly to what Victor Naidu described for ERP, large firms are frequently offering prebuilt solutions that still require extensive customization.
These solutions are also foreign to the client's established way of doing things, requiring them to learn new work procedures.
The solutions may only tangentially address the client's original problem requiring the client to buy more than they really need.

Much like Menlo Innovations, Inner Circle Media's solution is to suggest a phased approach in which they focus on exactly what the client needs. In future segments with Carrie, she will discuss product ideas that have arisen from this approach.

3 Comments

Jeremy Ward on November 19, 2007 7:49 PM

Carrie Hensel’s interview was very informative in the fact that I was not aware that there was a local company that could not only create and maintain our company’s website, but they could also help with some of the internal issues that restrict how we do business. For example, my company currently has one company create and maintain our website. We use standard, off-the-shelf software from Microsoft for our accounting. We use Microsoft Access for tracking our orders through our system. We currently have no system in place for MRP (Manufacturing Resource Planning). It sounds as if a company such as hers, could come in and develop a system unique to us, our product, and our customers that could tie in many, if not all of the different systems that we have going on, in one web-based system. This is a very intriguing concept. The idea of having a system that is designed for only the things that we require, without paying extra for all the things that we don’t require but still have to take. In addition, if it was web based, our sales staff across the country, as well as our world wide system of distributors, could log in and extract the information they need, such as order status, outstanding PO balances, etc… Our Customer Service Department spends a great deal of time support our Sales Reps and Distributors with mundane tasks such as determine when a customer can expect their delivery, or why a customer’s order has been placed on hold for payment issues. As system such as this could simplify that entire process and let the Customer Service get back to actually servicing the Customer. Regards, Jeremy Ward

Alina Henry on March 27, 2008 2:12 PM

My name is Alina Henry. I am an undergraduate student at Eastern Michigan University and I am studying business management and entrepreneurship. I will be graduating in April 2009. I was fascinated how Carrie wants to take a little firm and go up against large firm with more people and power. She seems the type that won’t back down. The problem with large firms is the pre-built solutions they offer for problems as Carrie mentioned. Many companies find management systems that come in and set up new programs and cost the company a lot of money. Inner Circle Media has such a vast competitive edge because they make a system tailored to the client/company. Not only does have a system made for your company save you money, but time and convenience. Companies that have been using the internet for advertisement or a main way of business are finding that their web pages are out of date or hard to maintain. Inner Circle Media has the solution to help companies stay on the competitive edge. I am finding out that companies have a hard time with their websites and Inner Circle Media has cornered the internet market and provided solutions to help them. Business’s websites can not have fantastic web design and multi media functions. This is important marketing strategy, because if a customer is judging a company by the looks of the website, that website has to be eye catching. From the interview I gathered that Inner Circle Media likes to be one-on-one with their clients. What is comforting and a great way to run a business is they offer a solution that happens over time. They work with their clients to customize the programs they need and in return this save the company money because they are not getting programs they don’t need and time because they are learning how to use the programs. I really enjoyed this interview on Michigan Innovators because it is a company that is fresh and targeting a market that is growing and will need expansion and maintenance. Alina Henry

M. Hogan on March 31, 2008 9:24 PM

Dear Carrie Hensel, I found your interview very interesting, I was unaware that some companies do not maintain their own web site instead they hire an outside company to do it for them. It is great to hear that a company is as personal as yours is, going to other companies to meet the people rather than providing service over the phone is a great way to show that you care about your job and the people you do it for. You provide the help they rather than you telling them what they need. You are really meeting the needs of your clients. So many times people know they need help but don’t know what they need, and when trying to find sufficient help without being charged for things they don’t need it hard to find. I think many in many cases people need someone to take the time to listen to them. We live in a busy world and so many times we overlook the small stuff such as spending the time listening to people’s needs. I think it is so hard to find friendly knowledgeable staff, you mentioned it your interview that your staff will spend their weekend figuring out work related web site problems for clients, I think that quality is hard to find in employees. I work for a recreation center, I hear so often that people don’t like coming to work and often find every excuse to go home early. I love what I do; I go to work to improve the quality of the center, and how we do our daily operations. I find work to do and try to make a difference while doing it. In all my business classes at Eastern Michigan University I learned the importance of word of mouth and how powerful it can be. I think word of mouth can make or break a company. It is the fastest marketing strategy in today’s business world. I planned a wedding last year and many of my contacts were from my family and friends. Word of mouth in some case can make planning for something much easier and less time consuming. Thank you for your experience and wisdom. M. Hogan Eastern Michigan University Student

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