Come and Visit vs. Go and Tell: Secret to Growing a Business

The Little Red Church on the Big Island of Hawaii

Last week during a devotional time Derek Schoenhoff, Pastor of The Little Red Church, on the Big Island of Hawaii asked who authorized the temple? He opened my eyes to how much man wanted the buildings and not God.

Today many churches have this idea of inviting people to their programs at their buildings. Ya'll come now. Come and visit has become the mantra.

This is not the only thing that turns us inward. Many of us understand that Jesus died for us. The problem with continuing down this road of thought is that we can become very self-centered.

Rick Warren starts his Purpose Driven book with "It's not all about you." Derek Schoenhoff is reminding us of Jesus last words to his disciples to "Go and tell."

What I have discovered the past few years when it comes to business, I too had become very self-serving and asking folks to come and visit my website. Come and find me.

The more I read the scriptures the more I learn about a God who came to earth to serve rather than to be served. He asked us to do the same.

What I have been doing the past couple of years is exploring how to be a servant to my clients. First of all you need to know this is quite difficult and I continue to fail in my efforts, but I do believe I am starting to see this is the path to success.

Jesus told us to go the second mile, but in order to do so we have had to already gone the first mile.

So, what I have learned is for most of my career I focused on making better pictures. If you build it they will come. What I have learned watching many of my friends careers falling apart is most folks know the difference between bad and good photography and very few the difference between good and great.

Why didn't they know how much better I was than who they were using for their photography? My work was better than most, but there were others better than me. What was strange was those who I thought had better work than me were also struggling. Those whose work was OK were flourishing.

So, this past year I finally had a moment when it clicked. People know the difference also between good and bad service, but also most of them all knew the difference between good and great service. Even more amazing was people were paying top dollar for that service treatment.

People pay for the experience as much as for the product. If you have been trying to build a better widget and figure the world will come and buy--they may, but you will build a better business when you have focused outward. Going to them and doing whatever it takes to make their lives better and more comfortable.

Those most relevant in social media are those who share and are focused not on themselves but others. Do you want to grow your business--then focus on service, no matter what your widget is.