Good Isn’t Good Enough
A good friend of mine is a designer. His ideas are good. His service is good. The artwork on his blog is good and the information is easy to access. Everyone I know thinks he’s an all around good guy.
He’s the guy everyone invites to every event. They ask his advice and solicit his input. His reputation is impeccable. He has a pile of references. Everything about this guy is good, except his business. No one chooses him for their projects.
Could it be that he’s the wrong kind of good? Can being good be not so good for business?
When Is Being Good Not Good for Business?
In a blogosphere of 80 million blogs, being good isn’t enough to get noticed — that’s something folks might not recognize right away, but eventually we all tune in. This conversation is bigger than that. Some folks I know are more than good and it’s that very fact works against them in at least five ways.
- Good makes some folks think they don’t need to be nice. Having the skills to do a job well doesn’t go far if folks don’t like to work with them.
- Good makes some folks think that the world will eventually come to them. It’s naive to think that the rest of world has time to find out what we don’t have time to tell them in a compelling way.
- Good makes some folks focus on perfection. They end up adding quality only they can see. That drives up their costs and lowers their understanding of how clients see their work.
- Good makes some folks unable to talk about the price of their work. They feel that a true artist or a “good person” shouldn’t ask for money.
- Good keeps some folks from being great. It’s hard for some folks to take risks when they’ve achieved a place of some stature. Thoughts turn to defending against what might be lost rather than what could be won.
What good is being good if it’s not good for your business? Being centered on those we serve is more fun and less complicated to do. Deciding how to offer a unique value to the people we work with and for makes a whole slew of “good” issues disappear.
In what ways do you think being good can be not so good for business?
–ME “Liz” Strauss
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Hi Liz – This is a great point. I think so many businesses become focused on being the best that they can be, instead of being good enough and putting a lot of that extra effort into marketing.
I speak to many people who tell me they expect to get a lot of business through word of mouth if they just keep doing a good job. But, the trouble is, in most cases, you need to do a lot of things to encourage that word of mouth and doing a good job is just not enough.
Catherine, you’re certainly putting a lot of effort into marketing yourself. I see you everywhere!
And yes, great marketing is essential. I heard someone put it this way: there are plenty of people out there with voices better than Sinatra’s, but no one will ever find them because they’re only singing in their garages.
Hi Catherine!
I’ll never settle for less than my customer wants, but I’ll never think my standards are more important than theirs either. Product is marketing from the conception to the delivery of the last smile.
I agree with what you’re saying, with this caveat . . . marketers can make the same mistakes as product developers do . . . 🙂
Hi Hunter!
Thanks for the comment. I love the Sinatra example. Many times it’s not what we can do, but who knows what we can do. 🙂
I was reading an interesting blog post the other day which touched on this VERY subject.
Mike Wagner wrote of his recent “medical emergency” and, being of a marketing mindset, realized that he had no point of reference as to the quality of the care he received.
In other words, the only thing he could accurately “judge” was his experience. He couldn’t judge the surgeon’s competency or skill.. but he did know when a nurse smiled.
Anyone who’s providing a service as their business needs to keep that story in mind!!! It answers the question we all ask when we see a competitor who is “winning” more customers than their technical “skill” should allow.
PS~
Catherine’s comment is right on!!! Customers EXPECT a good experience and when they get it… well, they tend to NOT be as vocal as when they don’t get good service.
He sounds too good to be true. Maybe that’s what is keeping him back. People have a strange tendency to doubt perfection. 🙂
But if anyone good makes the mistakes you enumerate above… they are probably not that good. Let’s not confuse goodness with infatuation and self-sufficiency.
Striving for perfection is what we should do. But in the process we should make ourselves perfect for the world and not for vanity.
Yeah Kathy,
Thanks for bringing Mike’s experience to this conversation. I think your point (and his) are so important. What we think doesn’t matter, what the customer thinks is relevant and important is the only thing that is. 🙂
Hi Michaela!
Of course, good is only as good as we think it is. I’ve never liked the word much myself. 🙂
I agree that folks do tend to stray about from folks who appear “too perfect or too nice.”
Hi Liz,
If customers get a good service they take it for granted. If they get a great one, they either get into the “is this really true” stage, expecting something to go wrong anyway, or rarely they email these really great testimonials. But most of the times, if you want references or testimonials, you have to reach out to those thinking it was a good experience and ask them to recommend you. Some will of course do it and their thoughts will surprise you. And if you are wondering about percentage, it sometimes happen that of over a thousand businesses that are your customers and/or your partners, you get a few dozens recommendations and just as many official references. If it’s a good end user product, it might be better, but not a lot better.
I believe it’s hard to quantify word-of-mouth, therefore it’s not extremely reliable. So waiting for it to happen without doing something is a mistake. If you’re good you should pray for it, but helping it happen is way better.
Wow, you can tell, I haven’t commented here in a while 😛
I suppose being “good” sometimes makes you to be more modest. For example one might tell to a client “I am not the best…” or feel guilty about the price that was quoted.
Yes, definitely “being good” might actually hold you back from going further.
This really is a head turning post. Thanks Liz.
hi Alina!
I agree. We expect good service. It’s what we pay for. Great service is something worth telling our friends about!
Of course, that assumes we have friends, that we’ll be talking to them soon, and that we’ll remember the great service when we do.
Word of Mouth is wonderful when it happens, but we can’t control or generate it. We can only make the circumstances that nurture it and hope that it does. 🙂
Other ways of reaching customers are important too.
Hi Shamelle,
It was head turning for me to think about it. We shoot ourselves in the foot for the most noble reasons. 🙂
To your last point . . .
“Good keeps some folks from being great. It’s hard for some folks to take risks when they’ve achieved a place of some stature. Thoughts turn to defending against what might be lost rather than what could be won.”
Good. Better. Best.
Why stay stuck on the low-end?
Putting yourself in a higher category brings out the best for you and your clients.
Thanks for the inspiration and motivation!
Barbara!
What a tagline that would make!
Good. Better. Best.
Why stay stuck on the low-end?
Good is often thought of in terms of quality, but there are other factors that can edge out good, such as reliability and integrity. You ask any business owner which they would prefer, skill or reliability, and I bet 99% of them would say reliability.
People need to know without a doubt that they can count on you. Can you promise them that? Then you will beat anybody who is “good.”
Many in business prefer to “under promise and over deliver”. They reasoned that since they did not over promise, the client cannot complain if they just deliver to expectation and not beyond. If they did over deliver, they reckoned the client will be extremely happy with the surprisingly good results.
Nothing wrong with that but I much prefer “over promise and over deliver” to “under promise and over deliver”. We are not going to get noticed if we are just a “me-too” problem solver. If we have the capabilities to surpass our client’s expectation, tell our client we can do that since we are going to do that anyway. After which, provide them with a quality work and service that wow them over. And yes, wherever possible, give even more.
It’s the extra mile we walked that the client appreciates. I see no harm promoting and selling ourselves sincerely. We do not want to be Sinatra in garage. Successful entrepreneur with a big heart should be on the stage offering his values.