Consumers have a new tool in their tool belt today: the mouse. Today's consumers are using the Internet to find information, obtain advice and buy products at an increasing pace. 

Though face-to-face customer interaction and phone calls are not going away, they're no longer enough. To stay relevant to your clients, you have to add a digital relationship to supplant your traditional ones.

It used to be that you would go to a travel agent, stockbroker or a financial institution to obtain information. Yet, today, information has found its freedom; it's escaped. You can obtain all the information you need about a product in seconds, and compare your offer to hundreds of others. We can't control the flow of information anymore, so we have to be available everywhere, 24×7.