Hey Reader,
A client once told me she was about to drop one of her offers. Someone had told her she had too many, and this was the one that should go.
The first part was true. She did have too many offers, far too many. To most people it was hard to see the difference between them.
But the one she was ready to cut was one her clients loved, and she loved doing it too, while several she planned to keep weren't serving anyone.
The advice sounded sensible. It just wasn't based on her business.
I see versions of this all the time. We make big decisions on a feeling, a hunch, or something someone else told us. And because we've been running our business for years, the hunch feels like knowledge.
Guessing feels a lot like knowing
The gap between what we think is happening in our business and what is really happening is often bigger than we'd like. The offer you call your core offer is barely selling, while the thing you added on the side brings in most of your revenue. The audience you write for isn't the audience that pays you the most, or the one you enjoy working with most.
Most people push back when they spot this, sometimes a lot. Their website, their content and their pricing are all built on a guess, so admitting it might be wrong means looking at everything. Which is exactly why it's worth looking.
Before your next big business decision
So think of one decision you're sitting on right now, Reader: dropping an offer, raising a price, trying a new channel or changing your audience. And ask yourself one question: What evidence do I have?
What your gut says doesn't count here, and neither does what someone told you. What is your research telling you?
- What do your sales, your numbers and your clients say?
- Where did your last few clients find you?
- Which offer brought in the most last year, and which one takes the most time for the least return?
If you can answer those, you're deciding. If you can't, you're guessing, and it's worth finding out before you change anything.
I'm doing this myself right now. There's something new I'd love to start offering, and it's been a half-formed idea for a long time. The easy route would be to build it on my own hunch about what people want. Instead, I've hired someone to go and talk to people and find out, before I build anything.
Hit reply and tell me the decision you're thinking about. Is it evidence or a hunch? I read every reply.
Your hunch might well be right. It's just worth checking before you cut the thing your clients love.
