Summary
- We are taught to compete on function and perfection, but function no longer creates value once basic standards are met.
- In dentistry, meeting clinical spec is required, but it only gets you to the commodity level.
- Commodities all do the same thing, which is why competing on function leads to price pressure.
- People do not choose based on function. They choose based on how something makes them feel.
- This is why a $500 pen, expensive wine, or natural diamond is valued far beyond their functionally superior alternatives.
- Meaning creates feelings, and feelings create value.
- Chasing small functional improvements through expensive effort does not make you more desirable.
- Once you meet spec, stop leading with function and start leading with meaning.
- Practices that understand feelings and meaning can raise prices and stand out without being “better” clinically.
This video might be a little controversial because we have been raised to focus heavily on function. Our entire school system is based on how correct you are and how closely you meet spec. If you meet spec, and if you are more perfect at meeting spec, you get a higher grade. The best you can do is get 100 percent, meaning you have met spec completely.
What I am proposing is that this is the lousiest way to engage in marketing, to create change for people, to raise your prices, or to become desirable.
To illustrate this, I have two pens here. One is courtesy of Neo Biotech, which makes dental implant materials. The other is from Montblanc. It is a Meisterstück pen. This probably costs less than a dollar to produce, while this one sells for about 500 times that. So why is Montblanc able to charge around $500 for a pen while other commodities charge about a dollar for the exact same function?
It comes down to understanding that there is an innate difference in how we value things. We no longer value things based on function. That ended around the end of the industrial revolution, when our functional needs were largely met. If you think about it, all commodities meet functional spec. Salt is salt. It is a commodity, yet it meets spec. It is very easy to catch up to spec. If someone creates something, it is easy to reproduce it in a lab and create the exact same thing.
In my workbook, one of the analogies I use is wine. There are $10,000 bottles of wine, and there are wines like Barefoot that sell for $5. The $10,000 bottle seems like it must be special, but if you think about it, it is just chemistry. It is tannins, alcohol, grape variety. You can reproduce that wine in a lab. The problem is that you get the same functional appeal, but you get vastly different feelings.
This is why the diamond industry still exists today. A lab-grown diamond creates a completely different feeling than a diamond with history behind it. That is what I mean by meeting functional spec. This is no longer the metric we use to gauge value. Everything meets spec these days. We have organizations and regulations, especially in healthcare, dedicated to making sure spec is met.
So focusing on function is not the path forward. If you are not meeting spec functionally, absolutely go learn what you need to learn and meet spec. Get to the commodity level. Then we can talk about feelings.
Another aspect of function is that it has marginal returns for expensive research and development. If you try to push the boundaries of function, it will not get you very far. Going back to the pens, they do the exact same thing. They write. This pen probably writes more smoothly than the Montblanc. It flows better and is lighter and more portable. Functionally, it is arguably better. Yet that is not why we value the Montblanc more.
We do not care about marginal improvements in function. We care about feelings. This is the basis of modern behavioral psychology. We make decisions based on feelings, not rationality. We do not carefully weigh function and say one is slightly better, therefore it is more valuable. If that were true, the cheaper pen would be worth more.
We value things that are meaningful. Meaning creates feelings, and feelings create value. Once you hit spec, stop obsessing over function. Stop chasing marginal improvements that you think will make you more attractive. They will not.
What matters is how you create meaning and how you evoke feelings. The good news is that there are not thousands of feelings we need to create. There are only a few core, ancient feelings, and we now have modern ways to evoke them.
If you operate in that realm, you will see far better results when it comes to increasing the value of your practice.