The Power of Creating Value

By Aaron S. Robertson

What happens when you as a business owner can't compete on price alone? That's when you introduce to your customers and prospective customers a strong ally of yours named Value.

Following is a message adapted from an e-mail I sent to my two business partners some days ago. We realize here at Intrepid Innovations that we're not always going to be able to compete on price alone. It's just impossible. While it's true that we live in a global economy all around these days, it especially hits home when it comes to the specific industry we're in, that of online marketing. Our industry, in particular, really knows no borders. There is no one company or number of companies, no one country or number of countries, that dominates this industry. It truly is a global free-for-all.

While reading the following message, reflect on the following questions:

• What can I do to create more value for my customers and prospective customers to justify price?
• Why should people do business with me when they can go somewhere else for less? What makes my business unique?

Here's that message:

On one of the walls in the conference room at the dealership I work at [Note to readers: I was recently employed at a car dealership as a salesperson], there's a statement that reads: "A buying decision is made when value exceeds cost."

In regards to Intrepid, I interpret that to mean this:

When it comes to our offerings, we're not always going to win on price. We'll certainly win on price once in a while, and we have in fact done so from time to time. But when it comes to price alone, we're not always going to win out over the Indians, the Asians, etc. in this highly competitive global economy.

That's where value comes into the equation. What can we provide that these others can't? Well, for starters, personalized attention and face-to-face contact, at least for those in the Metro-Milwaukee area. We're here among our customers. We're not sitting in some call center overseas trying to sell the exact same thing to everyone throughout the world. Being among our customers allows us to take a genuine interest in them and their goals. It allows us to build meaningful and beneficial business relationships with them, thereby expanding our network and theirs. It allows us to truly see the fruits of our labor by witnessing firsthand the smiles on their faces as they share with us how we helped them reach new customers and markets.

There's a lot to be said about the role value plays in a buying decision.