According to Barbara Findlay Schenck, contributor to MSN’s Business on Main, the three elements that all customers desire are price, quality and speed. Her advice for companies: “deliver on all three fronts to win and keep customers.”

In her article, Schenck lists out tips for accomplishing a good business reputation for price, quality and speed:

Be good at everything and great at something
Customers expect your business to offer quality at good prices with prompt service, but they don’t expect you to be the market leader on all three fronts.

Strengthen your strongest suit
Customers decide where to go for services, products, meals, or whatever else they’re ready to buy based on how well they believe businesses will address their wants and needs. If they aren’t sure what your business does well, they’ll opt for a competitor they trust to give them what they want.

Face and overcome your weaknesses
To grow your business, you have to attract customers who may currently think you don’t offer what they want and value.

Take action today
If the big guys can adjust their mammoth organizations to meet the market’s want-it-all demands, your nimble small business can certainly do it as well. Go for it!

Reading through, it’s not hard to see that these tips can be very useful in gaining business as well as retaining current customers. After all, it comes as no surprise that consumers desire and expect the best. This is particularly true considering that the economy is forcing many businesses to lower prices, increase speed and maintain quality in order to offer a competitive edge.

Yet, as simple as it is to invest much of your time, money and effort into what your company is best at—as the first two tips suggest—perhaps it might be more beneficial to focus on the weaker aspects of your company.

True, these underdeveloped areas don’t seem to have much value. They certainly don’t help make your business cheaper, better or faster. If they have any role at all, besides subjecting the company to slower productivity, potential failure and vulnerability, it is that old routines are familiar. But as The Methodology Blog has reported before, tradition alone is usually not a good reason to keep doing something the same way. If you only focus on where you are already strong, your efforts overshadow the areas where you have the greatest potential for improvement.

As the third and fourth tips suggest, DO face and overcome weaknesses; DO take action today! Slaughter Development believes whole-heartedly that acknowledging failure, no matter how large or small it may be, is an incredibly proactive way to bring about success. Take a moment to read our Reasons to Reach Out. You may just find a very good reason to contact us to learn more.

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