In an interview, billionaire Clay Mathile, creator of the pet food company ‘IAMS,’ said,’ It took me five years to realize I had a product that dogs wouldn’t eat and packaging that consumers wouldn’t buy.”.
There was now NOTHING ‘wrong’ with the merchandise. The meal was created to provide a dog with the proper nourishment. It accomplished this flawlessly. Customers were finding their dogs’ health would improve in just a few weeks. Despite this, ‘dogs wouldn’t eat it’ and ‘consumers wouldn’t buy it’.
Iams flourished like a plant once these small (!) issues were resolved, and Mathile finally sold the company to Procter & Gamble for $2.3 billion in 1999.
Many companies have products and services that are just a few adjustments away from being enormously successful. Could yours be among them? Simply put, your customers/clients/patients probably don’t despise your goods and services. But what steps can you take to determine how far you are from meeting your customers’ REAL EXPECTATIONS? Sometimes it’s not just enough to deliver on one front. You need to meet the market where it’s at. This is where your expertise, adaptability, and value shows. Do you have what it takes to change the conversation?
