What is your organization able to do with excellence? While others provide products or services that are chasing trends, built around buzzwords, or otherwise “me too,” you have an opportunity to show depth while they chase breadth. Instead of doing 50 things in a very forgettable manner, why not do 5 things that are noteworthy for their substance and quality?

Attention to Detail in the Age of Fast Moving Things

We’ve all felt the pressure to cover more ground in less time. But what happens if someone reaches a goal only to find that what got them there is coming apart? Or maybe it’s just not the right thing after all? Our prospects are looking for people who can provide solutions that they can rely on and that give them a solid return on their investment. Whether someone is buying a simple widget, or hiring you to perform a complex task, they want to know that the outcome will put them in a better place, and that what you provide will be robust, reliable, and really deliver what they need for the task at hand.

It's not about ladling on complexity and adding bullet points to your feature list, it's about making the points you have really count. In fact, when building the popular Basecamp application, 37 Signals made a point of having a smaller feature set than their competition. They believed that lucid simplicity would outshine cacophonous complexity. Millions of users later, their theory seems to have proven out. You don't need to hit every note. You need to hit the right notes and make them resonant.  

Apple has built an empire on this pursuit of excellence. Their products have a reputation for “just working” and going farther to do things better. Many other brands have also found loyal followers by cultivating an attention to excellence. For products, the design and materials create the user experience and suitability. Think about a well-crafted, ergonomic tool formed from quality materials that have been specifically sourced to provide that extra tensile strength, resilience, torque, or what-have-you. Or the caring attention to detail that creates a high-quality, flavorful and nutritional grass-fed, free range beef.

On the service side, perhaps your experience, your process, your unique approach - anything which shows that you invest in what you do and constantly want to move well past “good enough” and into places of greater achievement. Are you technology specialists? How do you wring the most from that tech to really empower your clients? How do you bring something more to the table beyond just competence as a commodity? Maybe you actually deal in a commodity - like energy. How does the service of providing that commodity take it the extra mile beyond mere adequacy, and into something that elicits a response in your customers of loyalty, and even passion?

Go Deep to Go Long

People are looking for answers that they can rely on. The real long-term solution to their needs is to find someone who provides solutions that are so well thought-through and crafted that they can be comfortable in relying on your business as the go-to answer. They know you are pursuing excellence, and by your having that as a goal in itself, they know you are a resource they can stick with.

How is this done? We walk with you through some honest introspection. What are you doing now that really shines? What can you push into in order to go farther? This isn’t a simple 5-minute exercise. We work with you to dig in and determine how you are cultivating excellence, and how you can do it more successfully. Once that’s sorted we then weave this thread into your messaging to let prospects see the substance that you bring to the table. This is the process we take clients through here at Hexatrope - one of asking strategic questions which draw out and give form and refinement to your brand so people can see your strengths.

And finally, once a prospect has crossed the threshold into doing business with you, remember that the continuing relationship is marketing - it doesn’t end at the initial sale. Communicate. Enlighten. Inspire. Deliver. Then rinse and repeat. (more on this next time)