Aim High
Dear Bizniks: I am excited to be more involved in this community so I am very happy about getting to contribute to the Biznik Blog. I’ll probably spend about half my time talking about digital media and the other half talking about business in general. And for my first post, I want to talk about small business vision.
Here’s the executive summary for those of you in a hurry.
Aim high!
Now for the rest of the story.
I enjoyed attending the Biznik blogging event with DL Byron this week. These events are a chance to get together with some of my favorite people in the world, i.e., entrepreneurs. I love the spirit and the excitement of small independent business. It gets my juices flowing.
I have attended three Biznik events so far and been very impressed by the organization and the people I have met. But I do see one problem that appears to be common to many of the small business people I hear from. And that’s lack of vision.
When you are small company and/or starting out, there’s a tendency to make all of your decisions based on your opinion of your circumstances. The problem is, your opinion may not jive with reality. Let me explain.
Just because you or your friends would never pay $250 for a massage or a haircut or a ride to the airport, doesn’t mean someone else won’t. You may price your goods or services according to what you can afford to pay or based on what you think they’re worth. That’s usually a mistake. You should base those types of marketing decisions on what your customers can and will pay.
I have met people in this world who can write a million dollar check without asking their spouse for permission first. There’s a great deal of money floating around in the universe. And if your business offers a product that really solves a problem, instead of offering a product that’s looking for a problem to solve, you may be surprised to find out what people are willing to pay you.
So aim high. After all, it doesn’t take any more pressure to squeeze the trigger when you’re aiming at the sky than it does when you’re aiming at the ground.
August 2nd, 2006 at 3:35 pm
Our aiming at your foot! Great points and clear vision. The question I would have is if your markets are covered in a fog, or you cannot get a clear focus on the market your business serves would it be best to ‘Fire for Affect’ in all directions? Or wait until the fog is cleared so you can turn the shot over to a Sniper to hit the Target Markets?
August 2nd, 2006 at 3:48 pm
Duke I’d say…
1) Focus is always the key point of any good marketing plan. Focus first (consider that part of aiming) then fire.
2) If your market is clouded in a fog, don’t wait for the fog to clear…buy a really big fan!
Seriously, focus solves most of the problem you describe, but the point I want to make is that most small business need to look outside their own experience before deciding their product’s price/value quotient.
If you’re getting price objections, the reasons are usually
a) Wrong target
b) Wrong product
c) Company didn’t spend enough time demonstrating value during the sales cycle
The answer is usually (c)
Hope that helps.
August 2nd, 2006 at 5:08 pm
Sound principles I can agree with. I have some tweaking I would make on them, but I’ll keep in touch. Great blog! Keep them coming.
August 3rd, 2006 at 7:33 am
Hey Scott,
Great post and welcome to the Biznik blogging club.
I think another symptom of the “Small thinking” disease is that a lot of entrepreneurs and small business people just don’t let themselves think about being successful. They focus on the little day to day problems that pop up in front of them and completely ignore the long term thinking that could have them happy and successful in the future.
August 3rd, 2006 at 8:23 am
Great reminder, Scott – thanks! I’ve tried to instill that concept into people before, but I don’t think I’ve ever used the right example.
“Just because you wouldn’t pay $250 for a massage, doesn’t mean others won’t,” is a great example, and one I’ll use.
I’d also take it one step further.
If you’re trully engaged in the game of networking, you’re also always keeping your ears pealed for requests for introductions. Just because you wouldn’t pay $250 for a massage or a ride to the airport, also doesn’t mean that the person you’re talking to wouldn’t, or the client they’re trying to take care of wouldn’t.
So not only should you aim high when setting your own rates, but you should also keep an open mind when talking to others who have aimed high with their rates. They may offer a service that you never intend to purchase for yourself, but you might know someone who would.
August 4th, 2006 at 1:16 pm
I have been thinking about this a lot.
For years I’ve been actively campaigning against Aiming Low.
By training and belief, I am a Symbolic Interactionist. People develop their ideas of their own, and by extension, their work’s worth, by interactions with others. When we hang with folks whose aspirations are mediocre or low, for all kinds of reasons, it becomes difficult to aim high. Additionally, it can be very difficult to revise our aspirations, if we have no experience with other/different realities.
The form of Aiming Low that interests me particularly is the Starving Artist paradigm, the one that says “real” artists must struggle and that artists who become commercially successful have Sold Out. Both tenets lead to artists who set prices on their work that are not “too high”.
Many, many Biznik members are rooted in arts (and healing) communities–both of can be wrought with Starving Artist and related paradigms.
Scott, your encouragement to Aim High is so important. A particular power of Biznik is the way it provides that encouragement, together with new and blatant examples of how loving, artistic people can Aim High in ways that really, truly, won’t cost us our soul.
(Indeed, I believe that to aim too low, is what will cost us our soul.)
August 5th, 2006 at 9:57 am
I appreciate the way everyone expanded this discussion to make it even more valuable. Thanks.