This question, answered honestly provides the roadmap for what you should be working on in your business.

More often than not, when faced with the answer to the question, we realize that what we’re actually working on doesn’t matter all that much to our clients.

Deep down, we already knew this.

But working on something that doesn’t have the potential to change things is a convenient place to hide while keeping up the appearance of being busy and maintaining the status quo.

Tinkering with the things that matter to our clients puts us under their scrutiny, and opens us up to self-doubt.

“What if I put in the effort and things are no better than before?

“What if I break the entire system by messing with it?”

“What if I inadvertently make things worse?”

“What if I make things so good that there’s a flood of new, high-ticket clients with high-ticket expectations that I can’t live up to?”

If we want to improve, however, to create work that has the greatest impact on the people we serve, sooner or later we need to get clear on what really matters to them.

What matters so much that they would pay twice what you’re currently charging?

What matters so much that they would invest more of their own time and effort to solve the problem?

What matters so much that they would put up with shortcomings elsewhere so long as these desires were being fulfilled?

What matters so much that the status quo isn’t enough?

Chances are, there are only a handful of things that matter this much to your clients.

Two of them are probably saving them time and earning (or saving) them money.

These are scary problems to address because of their obvious measurability.

If we commit to improving the results we achieve and fall short, we have nowhere to hide.

But if we do get it right?

If we focus our effort on solving the problems that really matter for our clients, and improving on them consistently, we join a very select group of businesses who genuinely have their customers’ interests as their North Star.

That’s not to say the other stuff doesn’t matter. It does.

But chances are you’ve been tinkering there in the background long enough.

It’s time to take on the big stuff.

And with it, become truly indispensable.

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