Value to The Customer

I had an interesting experience with my son yesterday. My son is 33 months old and loves cereal. As I brought out his breakfast, I mistakenly put a big spoon in his bowl of cereal and handed it over to him. Immediately he started eating, I realized my mistake, went back to the kitchen, got a small spoon, and replaced the big spoon with the small spoon. On realizing the switch, my son refused to eat and started crying. After trying all my parenting skills to get him to use the small spoon, I had to succumb to his request and returned the big spoon to him. From his perspective the bigger spoon represented more value than the smaller spoon did.

Quality in a product or service is not what the supplier puts in. It is what the customer gets out and is willing to pay for. A product is not quality because it is hard to make and costs a lot of money, as manufacturers typically believe. This is incompetence. Customers pay only for what is of use to them and gives them value. Nothing else constitutes quality. Peter F. Drucker,

In the market place, the customer's perception of a product's value determines how much they are willing to pay for the product or service. The value of a product or service is directly correlated with the type of problem the product or service solves for the customer - the benefits to the customer. This is why good sales personnel emphasize the benefits of a product or service more than the features. A business willing to remain relevant in the market would have answers to the questions: what value are we adding to our customer; how are the benefits of our products and/or services different from that of our competitors?

No matter how valuable an organization thinks a product or service is, if the customer does not perceive the advertised value at the same level as the seller, they will be reluctant to pay the asking price for the product or service. Value is determined by the market place, by the customer. The benefits - to the customer - of an organization's products or services must be understood, appreciated, realized and felt by the customer.

You Can Only Get What You Want, If You Help Enough Other People Get What They Want...Zig Ziglar