What Do You Really Sell?

Unless you’ve created the best thing since sliced bread, the electric light bulb, telephone or iPad, chances are whatever you’re selling is pretty much the same as what everyone else in your business is selling.

 

I know a lot of people who sell the same thing.  Some complain about needing to drum up more business, while others tell me business has never been better.

 

It’s usually the ones who need more business who come to see me.

 

The first thing I ask them is, ‘What are you selling’?

They mention their product.  ‘I sell insurance.’  ‘I sell payroll service.’  ‘I sell this, that, or the other thing.’

 

It doesn’t matter. You’re still in the dime a dozen category. You haven’t given people a reason to seek you out. They can buy what you sell anywhere. They know that.  What you sell are merely words unless you translate their value in terms of what your customer really wants. People may need your product, but it’s your job to make them want it.  There’s a difference.

 

 

So how do you convey that, and why should they come to you? What’s your perceived value?

Charles Revson, founder of Revlon sold makeup and creams. He used to say, ‘In the factory we make cosmetics.  In the drugstore we sell hope.’

 

Ask yourself what your customer really wants.  If your business is home security, you install alarm systems.  What the customer wants to buy is security and peace of mind.

 

You don’t sell products.  You make meaning.  Now tell me again, what is it that you sell?