Years ago I was working on a yard project putting a park bench on a small brick pad. I cut out the square for the pad poured the sand in the hole and began setting the bricks in place. Next thing I know my mother is bring out a level for the job. Are you kidding me? After the first rain the sand is going to shift making the bricks unlevel anyhow.
As long as I eyeballed it well, I was fine. She wanted to spend the extra time to get it exactly right. But it was my yard! Was it really worth arguing over 1/64th of an inch? We laugh about this today, but the same battle is happening all over the business world and...
Good enuff is winning
Because of the economy or our drive to have everything right now and easy to use, the level of acceptance of good enough is changing how we make products. My Flip video camera or my Nikon Coolpix photo camera are hardly the tools of exerts, but they are the fastest selling products in the digital video and picture market. What happened to multiple lens cameras and home move cameras with 100 different features? There are much better quality products with many more features but what is important to the customer?
What was important shifted.
Home movies no longer had to be about options, vibrant image colors and clarity. Most important now was how fast a video can be loaded onto the computer and uploaded to the Internet. Still cameras no longer had to be about zoom capability and lens features; it's about immediate feedback and the ability to share with friends.
Is a $5 pizza a work of culinary art? No it is cheap and filling, period. As Ray Croc, builder of the McDonald's brand used to say: We don't serve food fast -- we serve fastfood.
Do you know your customer?
Had I been paying my mom for that yard job and she charged me two extra hours to get that last 64th of an inch level, I would be upset. As the customer that wasn't what I wanted. That's like taking an extra few minutes to make sure the pepperoni is exactly placed across a $5 pizza!
The $5 pizza buyer wants it hot, wants it cheap, and wants it right now -- who cares if the pepperoni looks perfect!
Customers and suppliers are seeing things differently in the shift of importance. Some customers are looking for top quality and have the willingness to pay for it, which is why expensive photography equipment still has a piece of the market, although that market has shrunk significantly and it now more niche than mainstream. The suppliers are committed to their products want the best quality that can be made, but are customers willing to pay for it? You need to meet your customers where they want to be met. Know what they consider important.
Are you focusing on the right service with the customers in mind? If you are spending time on what used to be important to customers, you most likely are losing customers and don't understand why. Figure out what is important to them today and give them what they want.
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