Make Money Online With Snowboardjohn

I’ve spent a lot of time in mastermind groups, in focus groups, coaching groups, and so on.

Inevitably, one of the most oft repeated phrases is “Focus on the VALUE of what you’re offering and the money will come! Just focus on your VALUE and things will work out.”

Call me jaded but I don’t see things this way at all.

Is Coca Cola really successful because of the “value” of their product? How about Rothmans? How about Google? How about Microsoft?

Do you think Windows succeeds because of it’s superior programming?

Do you think Rothmans Cigarettes provides a valuable product?

Or Absolute Vodka?

Or Google provides “highly valuable” search results?

Bzzzzzttt Eeeeerrrrggghhhh - NO!

Absolutely not.

I wish the world was made up of valuable products, valuable services, and valuable people. It’s not. And life - and people - don’t reward value for value’s sake. Sorry.

How many wealthy successful men - who are good people - get used for their wealth in their personal relationships? The answer is a lot.

How many beautiful women, with intelligence and everything going for them, get used for sex and cast aside? The answer is a lot.

Value is a fairy tale we tell each other when we face uncertainty. It’s a Myth we want to believe in when we don’t know the answer to our problems.

“Sure Joe, you’re a great accountant - start that Accounting firm and offer a valuable service - people will flock to you in droves.”

They won’t of course. Because Value isn’t the full picture. It’s only part of a process.

That’s right: Value is part of a business process. It’s not some Magic Pill, it’s not something to be “believed” in - you can do without value - it’s not even a necessary process.

Having social proof, having a great provable business story (”I invested $5k of my own money and turned it into $1million in 5 years - let me show you how to do the same”), having a big competitive advantage (cheap warehousing, cheap advertising, cheap leads, fast delivery) and so on is what makes YOUR BUSINESS WORK.

Value is not a part of the equation. Value is a marketing word that companies with competitive advantage use to increase the ROI of their advertising dollars - and nothing more.

Sure companies like Godaddy offer a great service - and perhaps - that is “value”. But I don’t see it that way.

Bob Parsons is a consummate entrepreneur. Service is PART of his competitive advantage - he isn’t FOCUSING on providing “value” - he is focusing on dominating his market space.

The value his company offers is an indirect outcome of him executing his competitive advantage goals. Value is NOT his Modis Operandi.

And there’s a HUGE difference between those two mindsets.

When you think in terms of competitive advantage, market reach, and customer value - then you’re thinking like a real entrepreneur.

When you think in terms of value, your customers telling everyone about how great you are, and other intangible things - then you’re thinking like an idealistic newb.

Learn to be a great marketer, an intelligent economist (understand the numbers), and a risk averse gambler (diversifying your business risk) - and you’ll be a great entrepreneur. Forget about your ideals of providing “Value”. Do one day a week at a homeless shelter if you want to give back - but don’t do it in your business. You can’t afford it even if you don’t realize that you can’t.

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This entry was posted on Friday, September 28th, 2007 at 3:14 am and is filed under Make Money Online Tip. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.