During my regular morning read of the daily news this week I ran across the story about Microsoft’s recent stunt announcing the release of their new Vista operating system. They used colorfully dressed acrobats to scale the walls of a seven story building in downtown NY and hang the Microsoft Vista logo on the side of the building. From the pictures, I got the surreal impression that I was watching the Blue Man Group meets Richard Branson on its way to the Cirque de Soleil - a fitting stunt for a marketing savvy juggernaut.
But, as the maturing Microsoft reacts to a marketplace that is becoming more web focused with customers that increasingly expect products to integrate and operate with little hassle, one has to wonder can Microsoft turn the surreal into reality and make the shift. Largely because of competitors like Google and Salesforce.com, we see this shift toward software/service – web delivered functionality without the hassle of owning the software or much of the hardware. I suspect Vista will signal whether Microsoft is up for the challenge.
Historically, Microsoft has tightly bundled its functionality, provided little customer service and released software with more than a few bugs. On the face of those facts it is easy to predict that Microsoft doesn’t possess the DNA to survive in the new web based environment where functionality is unbundled in the form of widgets or gadgets, and customers have the power to easily uninstall if it is not working as expected. Microsoft’s software has proven to be so buggy that it has spawned a cottage industry managing its patches and security flaws. Norton, McAfee and others make a hefty sum shoring up Microsoft’s security breaches.
Of course, Windows is not the sole culprit when it comes to security breaches. The computer is much more than the operating system, and Microsoft is not the only software inside the box. When you connect that with the fact that Windows was released in 1987, 4 years before the internet was publicly available and we are still using the core of that system today, it’s nothing short of astounding.
Even more astounding though is the sixth sense that Microsoft had that the general public would willingly pay for something less than “perfection” when it came to their software. This approach to product development demonstrates an understanding that “perfection” is a judgment call made only by the customer, and that there is no price premium for “perfection” …unless you can charge for it.
In fact, all for-profit businesses strive to find that point where their product or service is just “good enough” - to sell in the market place, to beat back the competition or both. No business enterprise wants to give away too much. This mindset leads to different classes of the same product or service with added features and a corresponding tiered pricing structure. When executed properly multiple products with additional features and a corresponding tiered pricing structure always generate more revenue than a single perfect product. This is true because these products with added features reach different sub-segments (more people) in the primary market that the core product does not reach.
So, as Microsoft rolls out what will likely be its last desk top resident operating system the lesson that it teaches us is that being good enough can lead to greatness. If your company identifies what “good enough” is to its clients and delivers a solution that meets client’s “good enough” expectations, then your company will also move along this path toward greatness. However, doing that requires honesty about what you can truly deliver to the marketplace, and clarity about what your clients expect from your solution.
Interested in being good enough? Ask some of your customers and non-customers what they expect from a solution like yours, and if they think your solution meets their expectation. Also, take a hard look at your own capability to deliver on what your sample of customers and non-customers have told you. Then, build additional capability wherever you find deficiencies.
Leamon Crooms III
“The Guru of Growth”
