I’ve been thinking – will I be able to create a viable and valuable company if I don’t spend a significant amount of time with my customers? And spend even more time understanding their problem or needs?
Marketing experts talk and write endlessly about the need to solve a real problem for a real customer. And they warn entrepreneurs that they must listen to lots – maybe hundreds – of potential customers. And then they warn that before they start creating the product, the entrepreneur must settle on a core problem, which is common to many, that these potential customers will pay to have someone solve.
So, if this is true, I must be curious enough about the problem I am working to understand and solve. And I must legitimately care enough about these people to be committed to helping them.
I think this really is the role of the entrepreneur. And I think that if we hate learning about the customers and hate listening carefully to understand how we can help them do what they do better, we should STOP. I think we might be better suited to working in someone else’s company that won’t require us to listen, empathize, and really care about the customers – and about helping them, not just selling something to them.
What do you think?
Until tomorrow, GUNG Ho friends!