Allow your company to stay focused on its core offering.
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Whatever kind of business you run or industry you operate in, there will always be shiny objects to chase. When I was growing my own company, there was constant pressure from well-meaning investors, board members, and business partners: “Why don’t you buy this?” “Why don’t you create a product like theirs?” After careful consideration, the answer was most often no. Looking back, I believe those no’s allowed the company to remain focused on its core offering—healthcare navigation—and ultimately became our greatest competitive advantage.
Comparing Yourself to the Competition: One Cause of Shiny Object Syndrome
Many founders have “shiny object syndrome.” They have ten things going on at once, because they’re always chasing the next shiny thing. As a result, they never give their core offering the oxygen it needs to grow. One common cause of the problem is the comparison trap. If a competitor launches something new, the question inevitably follows: “Should we do that, too?” Sometimes, the question comes from the founder. Other times, it comes from board members, investors, business partners, and even customers.
However, being competitor-obsessed is a trap, because when you are, you let your competitor define you. My father always taught me that competition is not about you against others—it is about you against your best. The primary focus should always be your own company and what it does best to create value for its customers.
The Easter Basket Theory: Know What Your Chocolate Bunny Is
One way I describe thinking about this differently is through what I call the Easter basket theory. When you get an Easter basket, there is a lot inside: decorative grass and colored eggs and marshmallow peeps and little chocolate eggs—and then there is the one big thing that everybody is really after: the giant chocolate bunny. The chocolate bunny is the real prize. However, you can’t give someone an Easter basket with only a chocolate bunny in it. It would look sort of funny, rattling around in that basket without even a bed of fake grass to sit on.
So companies look for other stuff to put in the basket, adding products and services. But when they do that, they aren’t necessarily making sure those additions create value. They’re just trying to fill up the basket. The basket might look nice at first. But once their customers start to unpack it, they might not be so happy with what they find—just one good chocolate bunny plus a bunch of stuff they don’t even want.
The alternative is to be intentional about every single thing that goes into the basket. When faced with pressure about a shiny object—a new acquisition, a point solution, a technology everyone insists is essential—I always come back to the same grounding questions: how will this create value for the consumer?
The Competitive Advantage Comes from Focusing on Your Core Offering
Concentrating on a core offering is how you stay current with customer needs and desires. Instead of trying to make people happy with additional features, products, or services, you keep them happy by making your existing offering even better. The moment you become obsessed with what everyone else is doing and start chasing shiny objects, you’ve handed them the wheel. By being aware and strategically focused, you are defining your future and your position—and articulating your competitive advantage for the long term.