See the dangerous business habits that masked as a strategy

We like a good story, especially when it keeps us comfortable. In business, these stories often become rational myths. They look like logic, feel like experience, and excuse like truth. But in fact, they are just assumptions that are wrapped in confident tone.

You have heard them:

• “Consumers just care about price.”
• “Now no one wants to pay for the service.”
• “There is a lot of commodities to distinguish our market.”
• “People do not just read email these days.”

What makes these myths dangerous is not their perseverance, so we give them rational status. We tell ourselves that they are data based. (A survey from 2018? Please.) We refer to rivals. We assume that “the way things are.” And then we design the strategies, products and entire business models around them.

But these myths were born of ideas. Not facts. No vision. Only we have made the habit of seeing and describing the samples.

Let’s start from a classic: “Consumers just want the lowest price.”

It is like a B2B manufacturing client security blanket. Every RFP became a spiral under the waiver. When asked how they know that the price is the only factor, they pointed to the lost bid. But after diving into post -mortems with possibilities, the real reasons come out: unclear value, slow times of reaction and strict terms of contract.

The problem was not a price. It was The price. The possibilities did not see what the manufacturer had improved because nothing was told which really differences. He accepted the fiction and worked accordingly.

When they moved their attention to flexibility, transparency and active support, the things that consumers wanted but not found, were not the cheapest option. They were the most smart.

Related: 10 popular myths about 10 popular myths

The idea is the truth, but not always the truth

Humans are conceptual machines. We just don’t see the world, we interpret it. In business, we make statements around it based on our internal ideas. But consumers do not live within your boardroom, your orgth chart or your sales goals.

Frustrations, unnecessary needs and past experiences create their reality. Which means that if you are ready to dig a deep, you can create an impression.

Discrimination is not about getting higher. It is about to be clear on what it is. Most businesses try to stand by tweeting what they already offer instead of tapping customers’ desire but are not found. That space is the place where the impressions change and the myths begin to fall.

A logistics company once told me, “We are basically a commodity. Everyone moves in boxes.” He convinced himself that the brand does not matter, the experience does not matter, innovation does not matter. Therefore, they improved the performance of the performance and disappeared into the noise.

When we interviewed their users, something interesting came out. The client was anxious for the deceased. Real -time updates, active communication and easy invoicing. None of the rivals was doing good.

They leaned into it. Invested in client portals. Human touch points were added. Their messaging moved from “we moving goods” “We make sure you know where everything is.” The idea changed. They were no longer.

Break the fiction cycle

The rational myths are intact because we are listening to confirmation, no contradiction. We confirm what we already believe and ignore what we feel. But the strategy is not about being right. It’s about being relevant.

To break the fiction cycle:

1. Listen for space, not praise. Ask consumers what disappoints them, not only with your company, but with the whole category.
2. Challenge the internal Dagma. Just because it has always been like this does not mean that it still works or never does.
3. Discrimination of discrimination. It’s not about being “better”. It is about to offer that your customer is not really presenting the need as needed.

The myths are comfortable because they make the world a sense of prediction. But they are dangerous because they prevent you from getting ready. In fact, you cannot create meaningful discrimination on poor feedback. But if you are ready to challenge the myths and stories you say to yourself, you can find the white place that your competitors may not even see.

Consumers don’t always want much. They often want something different. And different is where real value and growth are.

Related: a new product development? Here’s a way of hitting success

The myths do not delay, they multiply

The problem is that myths do not just delay, they multiply. One assumption quietly supports the other unless you build a whole strategic house of cards. You stop checking, stop inquiries, and start filtering every new idea through similar lenses. And the real risk is so long that a myths are unruly, which makes it feel.

I have seen that the companies chased millions and chased a edge that did not exist, just because they never bothered to ask consumers to ask them what they had. The quarterly report is not in the survey buried. Not through the best of the sales team. But directly, clearly, without prejudice to defend past decisions.

Because it is a net. When your brand, process and pricing are made on unrealistic beliefs, you are not doing a strategy, you are playing gambling.