Not being the expert


Not behaving like the expert can take many forms.

One of them: trying to avoid pushback, arguments, or resistance in your relationship with clients. It can hurt you more than help.

You can be in the order-taking business, if you prefer. And that's fine. The impact that comes from it, though, will be smaller.

You can be in the service business, where your impact will be higher.

Or you can be in the transformation business, and help them achieve the potential your customers have.

How you want to be the expert —or not— is up to you.

Rod Aparicio

Get one tip, question, or belief-challenge that just might change the way you market, to help your customers buy. A *daily* email for b2b founders on improving your business —without the bullshit.

Read more from Rod Aparicio

One way that makes the process of articulating what's different about you simpler (not less painful, though) is through your insight. April Dunford defines insight as "the thing we understand about the market that the others do not." It starts with what you see in the market that doesn't make sense, that makes you cringe, that pisses you off. And the way you approach it that's in another direction from what everybody else does. It's your understanding. That's what makes you different.

They're all a by-product. You don't look for them as the main focus, they are the result of what you do in service to your customers.

A common pattern that I see in people who are new in leading positions is they try to maximize the results. What's that even mean? That in order to get the best results, you have to seize the right time. At uni, it might work. In real-life... not so much. Because it's about waiting. Waiting for the right time. Time that might never come (as perfect as expected). In business, the right time is not too early, nor too late. The right time is when you make a decision. A decision that might be...