Poor firms ignore their competitors; average firms copy their competitors; winning firms lead their competitors.
Philip KotlerRead
Companies pay too much attention to the cost of doing something. They should worry more about the cost of not doing it.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Companies focus excessively on expenses and overlook the potential losses from inaction.
Philip Kotler emphasizes that businesses often become overly concerned with the immediate costs associated with a decision while neglecting the larger picture of what could be lost by not taking action. This perspective encourages organizations to consider the long-term implications and missed opportunities that can arise from indecision or risk aversion.
Themes
BusinessActionCostOpportunityDecision
In practice
Example use cases
In a business presentation discussing strategic investments.
More from Philip Kotler
All quotes βMarketing is becoming a battle based on information than on sales power.
Philip KotlerRead
The art of marketing is the art of brand building. If you arenot a brand, you are a commodity. Then price is everything and the low-cost producer is the only winner.
Philip KotlerRead
Marketing is a race without a finishing line
Philip KotlerRead
The key to branding, especially for smaller firms, is to focus on a limited number of issue areas and develop superb expertise in those areas.
Philip KotlerRead
Marketing is not the art of finding clever ways to dispose of what you make. It is the art of creating genuine customer value.
Philip KotlerRead
Similar quotes
Business men are to be pitied who do not recognize the fact that the largest side of their secular business is benevolence. ... No man ever manages a legitimate business in this life without doing indirectly far more for other men than he is trying to do for himself.
Henry Ward BeecherRead
I think any company should compete on the quality of their products, their prices, the novelty they can produce, their services, because that would be fair competition.
Margrethe VestagerRead
The business world worships mediocrity. Officially we revere free enterprise, initiative and individuality. Unofficially we fear it.
George LoisRead
The most important thing you can do is make the distinction between customer service and guest hospitality. You need both things to thrive, but they are completely different.
Danny MeyerRead
We've done price elasticity studies, and the answer is always that we should raise prices. We don't do that, because we believe -- and we have to take this as an article of faith -- that by keeping our prices very, very low, we earn trust with customers over time, and that that actually does maximize free cash flow over the long term.
Jeff BezosRead
I don't look at business as a zero-sum game. I don't. I've never seen it play out that way in our industry, and I think you innovate and you add value, deliver value back to customers, and you get value back from the world.
Marc BenioffRead