Seth Godin on Benefit of the Doubt

Seth Godin has a good post on when people give others the benefit of the doubt. While he discusses miscommunication, it can be extended to include the lack of communication. I read somewhere that when you don't communicate anything, people will make something up themselves to fill the void. Often, because most people will not give you the benefit of the doubt, what they make up is worse than the truth.

This is a key point for managers: communicate enough so that people do not have to make things up, but not so much that you are bugging people. Since people are individuals, learn over time how much information of various types your teammates desire and customize your communication style accordingly.

Punishing Loyal Customers

I am frequently surprised by companies that offer better deals to non-customers than they do to their existing customers. At Constant Wave, we have a policy that no one should be disadvantaged because they trusted us with their business or were an early adopter. When we run special discounts aimed at acquiring new customers, we offer the same discounts to existing customers.

This is another advantage to the SaaS (Software as a Service) model. Since our customers rent the software, we can easily apply a discount to the next month's fee. A sales model would require us to rebate a portion of the purchase price to existing customers.