Goodwill is the only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.
Interpretation
Goodwill is an intangible asset that represents the trust and reputation a company has, which cannot be easily replicated or diminished by competitors.
This quote by Marshall Field highlights the importance of goodwill as a valuable asset in business. It suggests that goodwill—built through strong relationships, trust, and a positive reputation—is something that cannot be easily matched or taken away by competitors, as it is rooted in the experiences and perceptions of customers. Unlike tangible assets, goodwill represents a company's unique character and the loyalty it cultivates with its clients, making it a formidable advantage in any competitive market.
In practice
In a business seminar discussing the importance of maintaining customer relationships, one could cite this quote to emphasize the value of goodwill.
Those who enter to buy, support me. Those who come to flatter, please me. Those who complain, teach me how I may please others so that more will come. Those only hurt me who are displeased but do not complain. They refuse me permission to correct my errors and thus improve my service.
Let advertisers spend the same amount of money improving their product that they do on advertising and they wouldn't have to advertise it.
Profit is not the purpose of a business, but rather the test of its validity
In this business, by the time you realize you're in trouble, it's too late to save yourself. Unless you're running scared all the time, you're gone.
Corporations hope that the right concept will turn things around overnight. This is what you might call the crash-diet approach: starve yourself for a few days and you'll be thin for life.
Most marketers think there's a concept called a product life cycle. Once you realize that the world is organized by jobs that need to be done, you understand that product life cycles don't exist.
The companies that survive longest are the one's that work out what they uniquely can give to the world-not just growth or money but their excellence, their respect for others, or their ability to make people happy. Some call those things a soul.
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