At the end of the day, the goal of every company is to make money. So, ultimately, a business values things that make it money. We should always do our utmost to deliver value to our business by giving it the things that will help it make money from its customers. But focusing directly on business value is not good idea. Making money is most definitely the goal but focus must be on the source of revenue - the customers or end-users. If a business focuses on the money it eventually does wrong by its customers and they go away and it makes less money.
Imagine a business that makes reasonable money from adverts displayed in a heading or sidebar on its Web site. As user numbers increase, the business sees the potential to make more money from advertising and increases the amount of advertising space on its pages. It also introduces pop-up adverts, all without considering the effect on the users' experience. It turns out that customers don't like the more intrusive advertising. It gets between them and the reason they visit the site so they gradually stop visiting. The business is left with plenty of adverts but fewer customers to click on them.
Pursuit of revenue to the detriment of customers is a pretty good way to not make money.
Drucker said every company should ask itself 3 questions:
Who are our customers?
What are their needs?
What do they consider value?
To make money a business needs to focus on its customers' perception of value. Give customers what they want and they'll be happy to give you their business. Continue to give them what they want and they'll come back, time and again, creating opportunities to make further money. To deliver value to customers with high-quality, reliable solutions and to move forward with customers to satisfy their evolving needs, a business needs to understand the customers' world, what the customers are trying to accomplish and, beyond that, imagine where the customers are going.
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