People Buy What They Want – So Quit Trying to Sell Them What They Don’t Want

The Business Trendsetter Podcast

Business leaders think very unidirectionally about their business. Meaning they think about how to push more of what they have onto customers. But customers tend to be unwilling to buy what they don’t want. Eventually leaders scratch their heads asking “why can’t I sell more stuff” without realizing the obvious problem is you aren’t selling the right stuff.

This podcast uses a trio of scenario exercises to point out how we lock into our Value Delivery System, and forget to address our Value Proposition. We don’t ask folks what they want, instead we try to sell them what we have. We don’t like trying to sell new solutions, because that requires a lot more effort to learn than just doing more of the same old thing. Universally we over-invest in improving what we know and have to sell, and underinvest in exploring what we don’t know and developing new solutions that meet emerging needs.

Aging demographics and growing environmental awareness is creating new needs every day. But are you thinking about those new needs? Are you trying to develop new applications for the metaverse – or are you laughing at the declining value of Meta and CEO Zuckerberg? Are you thinking about how to sell more to younger people and people in new markets, or are you trying to milk your existing business and declining customer base for all it’s worth? This podcast will help you rethink your business problems to be more successful

Thinking points:

• How much time every week do you think about launching entirely new products based on new technologies?
• Do you ask customers what is replacing what you currently sell?
• Do you “over shoot” the requirements by making products better than customers really need?
• Do you constantly ask customers what they need, even more than asking them how well your Value Delivery System is working?