Everyone who succeeds says no to things

Saying no in business can be necessary even when a customer is standing there with money ready. I talk about keeping Dinero simple and choosing the talks where I believe I can deliver a really good experience.

The video is from February 2016. User numbers, prices and information about my talks describe the situation at that time.

Saying yes in business can cost you other customers

I hear from people who would like to use Dinero if we just changed one small detail. They’re willing to pay, and the change might take only a couple of days. Sometimes even just half an hour.

So saying no can seem stupid. But I also have to think about all the other users. If every new customer’s wish becomes another button or feature, the program may end up being hard to understand for the people we already help.

In the video, I use a hypothetical example: We had around 7,700 paying users. A new customer might pay 147 kroner a month, but if the added complexity caused ten percent of existing customers to leave, we would lose 770 users.

It’s an example of the trade-off, rather than a measurement of what one particular feature had cost us. The point is that the new income can’t be considered on its own.

A product has to suit its target audience

I’m critical of accounting programs that, in my view, have become patchworks of every imaginable feature. There’s barely a detail they haven’t included.

That may be fine if the target audience is experienced bookkeepers and accountants who work with accounts all day and want to be able to do everything.

But Dinero is also for the small entrepreneur who needs to get out and paint, saw, give talks, design websites or give massages. That person doesn’t necessarily want an accounting course or have the money to get others to do all the work.

For that audience, we have to maintain the simplicity. That’s why we can’t just add everything people ask for.

When you choose a target audience, you’re also choosing to leave things out. And one of the hardest things is saying no to a customer standing there with money ready. Or to an existing customer threatening to leave.

I also turn down speaking engagements

I do the same with my talks. In the video, I explain that my three core subjects are entrepreneurship, innovation and success.

I’ve often been asked if I could just give a talk about something else. It has been hard to say no, especially during periods when I made my living from giving talks.

But it also meant I had a clear focus on my audience when the financial crisis hit in 2008. I knew who I could give a really good experience.

I say that my ratings were typically at least 4.5 out of five, with a few exceptions. In my view, that’s connected to saying no when an assignment isn’t right for me.

A mediocre experience isn’t good enough

If I think I can deliver an experience of around four out of five, that isn’t good enough for me or the organiser. I want to choose the assignments where I believe we can reach 4.8 or 4.9.

At that time, I gave around twenty talks a year. That’s what I had time for, so I chose from the enquiries that came in.

Back then, I charged 35,000 kroner plus VAT and travel, and was about to raise the price to 40,000 kroner. If I couldn’t deliver value that justified that price for an organiser, I was the wrong person for the job.

That allowed me to earn a decent amount while delivering something that suited the people I went to speak to.

Respect the audience’s time too

I know speakers who charge much less but spend many hours preparing and travelling. It can add up to fifteen or twenty hours of work for a few thousand kroner.

If the audience also thinks it was just okay, then in my view it’s a poor solution for both parties.

It’s also about all the people who spend their time listening to the talk. A couple of hundred people’s time deserves more than a mediocre experience.

Choose the work you can deliver really well

When you build a business, choose the audience you can give great value to. Stick with it.

When someone asks you to go in a different direction, you have to be able to say a polite no, thank you. Out of respect for them and for yourself.

Then you can get paid properly, enjoy having delivered something good and avoid wasting other people’s time. It takes courage to say no, but for me it’s an important part of building a good business. You can find my own experiences of developing companies in Iværksætter til jeg dør.

Historical reference in the post: "Dinero now has more than 80,000 registered businesses" – Click here