what business are you really in?

Much of our time is focused on the vital task of getting more customers and selling more of what you sell to those customers, getting them to purchase more frequently.

But there is another option. What about selling them something else? Not your core product or service, but just something they want?

This involves grasping a fundamental principle: despite what your accountant tells you, the most important asset in a successful business is not equipment or property. It is the relationship a business has with its customers.

"...the most important asset in a successful business is not equipment or property. It is the relationship a business has with its customers."

When a customer first spends money with you, they become an asset with a clear potential value because they’ve done something very significant. They’ve jumped the hurdle of trust that has to happen before someone gives you money. Despite all the choices out there, all the competition, they chose to do business with you.

That makes them 10 times more likely to do business with you again compared to someone who hasn’t — and it doesn’t matter too much what you sell them.

"[The customer has] jumped the hurdle of trust that has to happen before someone gives you money."

If you sell lawnmowers, you could be tempted to think that the important part of the transaction is that the customer bought a lawnmower. So you start to think of other garden products you can sell to them, which is obviously a smart thing to do.

But the really smart approach is to understand it isn’t that they bought a lawnmower, it’s that they chose to buy it from YOU. It’s the relationship that counts.

So here’s a crazy idea. Once you’ve sold them all the garden stuff you can, what if you call them or email them and ask if they need a sofa. If they do, you tell them you’ve teamed up with a great local sofa company and together you’ll sort the sofa of their dreams.

Branch out from your niche by liaising with other trusted companies.

The potential for this is limited only by your imagination and your willingness to be tenacious. You can choose to offer something that has a similar theme to what you currently sell, or you could offer something completely different. There are no rules.

Just ask the richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos. Can you think of anything dafter than offering the buyers of an ecommerce delivery company (Amazon), a streaming media service and building a movie and TV business off the back of it (Amazon Prime)?

So what business are you really in? Are you in the business of selling the specific product or service you offer and limited to that for the rest of your Entrepreneurial life? Or are you in the business of enhancing your customers’ lives? If it’s the latter, start asking yourself what they want and need and how you can either provide that or be the concierge that introduces them to those who can provide it.

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