If You Only Knew
Knowing what you don’t know means having an understanding of and a respect for all the knowledge you do not possess. It would be difficult for anyone to possess all the answers and to know all the questions. Two major stumbling blocks can prevent a small business from becoming successful.
The first one is thinking that you know everything and believing that no one else was as smart as you were to see a great opportunity. The second one is the refusal to admit that there are unanswered questions about your business. There is nothing worse than being blind to customers’ needs. You must learn what those needs are because this is a time of rapid change (i.e., e-commerce, instant communications, and changing attitudes).
Some companies are entering the same marketplace as you and making millions of dollars. Where do you think this money is coming from? It’s coming from your customers, the current and potential ones you’ll never meet.
Customer needs change, evolve, and grow. For example, customers who order the same size pizza with the same toppings from the same store week after week will eventually develop the need to try something different. They might change their orders or try a new pizza place that recently advertised a new crust or some unusual toppings.
There are many opportunities for you to find new ways to satisfy customers’ needs. If you ran a pizza operation, you could easily ask your customers when they called in their orders if there is a new topping that they want. Maybe they tried a pizza from a competitor and discovered that they liked it. You might begin to offer this new topping if enough people requested it.
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