26/06/2026
Some of the best businesses I've come across are growing surprisingly slowly.
Not because they lack capability. And certainly not because they aren't creating enough value.
Founders spend years improving their products, refining their processes and building stronger teams. The assumption is that if the business creates enough value, the market will eventually recognize it.
But markets don't work that way.
Customers are constantly making trade-offs with their time and attention. They rarely have the time, patience or incentive to understand why one business is better than another. They compare, simplify and move on. In fact, the more choices people have, the less effort they're willing to invest in understanding each one.
That's why businesses with exceptional products often struggle to grow, while others with objectively less to offer continue to win.
Not because they're better but because they're easier to understand.
Understanding takes effort. And in a crowded market, effort becomes a hidden cost that customers instinctively try to avoid. Businesses that make their value obvious reduce that cost. Those that don't unknowingly ask customers to do the work instead.
Perhaps that's why businesses sometimes ask the wrong question.
Instead of asking, "How good is our product?" a more useful question might be, "How much work does a customer have to do before they understand why we're worth choosing?"
The answer to that question may explain more about a company's growth than the product itself.
