The term ‘lean’ has been the flavor of the season! Hoards of companies have implemented lean principles and have been gaga over the same, claiming higher profits than ever. So, what is lean and why has it gained so much popularity in the business world? Well, the basic idea is to remove inventories so as to minimize wastes and maximize customer value. In other words, lean means maximum value production with minimal resources.

Lean is not a tactic for cost reduction program, but a lot more than that. It takes a long term perspective of productive thinking and acting for an entire organization. Lean applies to every business, no matter how big or small it is. It improves your profit, but how? Let’s try to understand this way. As we all know that selling price is a sum of profit plus costs. Now, a company cannot charge an absurdly high amount for its goods or services to make more profit. More profit can be ensured only when the waste is minimized and costs are kept to a minimum. Companies implying lean can cleverly make significant cost savings, increasing the profitability.

Talking about small companies or startups, another principle called Blue ocean strategy comes into picture. Blue ocean strategy helps small startups to grow, by allowing them to cater to a section of customers that look for a high value product at low cost. These startups compete in uncontested market spaces that are ignored by their bigger counterparts. Low cost means zero waste and high value end product, earning customer loyalty and high profits at the same time. The concept can be seen as a distant cousin of lean theory. Mr. Dwarika Tripathy, CEO, Auroinfo, LLC and Chairman, ArcWeb Designing SMAC, has proposed a new concept that incorporates the best from both the worlds; it’s called ‘lean searching’. He came up with this theory while preparing for his topic about “Future of SEO” for SES New Delhi conference held in 4th December 2012.

‘Lean searching’ is an easy way to digital marketing and search engine optimization. It basically focuses on optimizing search results to achieve best possible ranking organically in shortest possible time and at minimal expenses. This not only helps small business to rank high in search results, but also allows them to work with great efficiency. Big enterprises can also imply ‘lean searching’ by optimizing the resource spending and using the right methodology and technology to achieve a sustained and progressive result.