Focusing on too many details can kill your business. And I'm not talking about details from the standpoint of being careless about them. While it's true that being careless can hurt your business, everybody knows that (even if they don't always put it into practice).
I'm referring to the way details can kill your business is if you focus to heavily on them.

Say what?

How on earth can focusing too much on details hurt your business?

Ever tried to walk on a railroad track?

When I was a kid, we lived in a house about a half block from a railroad track. One summer day, a group of us kids challenged each to see how far we could walk on the track without falling off.

Hey, it's not like walking a tightrope, right?

A railroad track is about as wide as the average kid’s foot. So, it should be no problem at all!

I can win this!

So one-by one, my friends started walking. They could only manage to get a few steps before falling off.

Then my turn came around, and I stepped up onto the track. But I quickly realized the mistake they were all making as I nearly lost my own balance after two or three steps. When I stepped onto the track, I first made the same mistake as all the rest of my friends - I was carefully watching my feet with each step. But in focusing on my feet, I realized I couldn't get more than a couple of steps before losing my balance.

After nearly making the same mistake, I quickly recovered and started looking further down the track. I realized the only way to walk that track successfully was to look at a point a further down the track - not down at my feet.

By setting a goal and focusing on it, I could walk on that track as easily as if I was walking right on the ground. It was only when I focused on my feet that I tripped up.

It works that way with business, too. Our natural reaction is to put all our attention into "watching our feet" as we deal with this short-term detail and that. But when we do that, we "fall off the track" of where we wanted to go.

Now, I'm not saying that we should ignore the details of our business as we gaze wistfully toward our vision of the knock-out business we dream of building. You never get anywhere without taking step after step after step to reach your goal. But you never get anywhere, either, if all you look at is the present step.

The point in the distance that you need to focus on is the need your audience has and the solution you have that will fill it. It requires you to understand your audience - who that customer is and what they need. What concerns stand in the way of that customer choosing your solution over a competitor’s?

It is far too easy for us to focus on details, namely, on the latest promotional fad, the latest bells and whistles we can add to our website. Details are usually driven by facts, and facts are something we feel we can learn and control.

Understanding the individuals who make up our pool of potential customers is far more difficult – even frightening! It requires us to step outside ourselves into the hearts and minds of other people.

Given the choice between dealing with predictable facts and details or the choice of dealing with unpredictable human nature, most of us will jump at dealing with hard facts any time.

But that just gets us stuck staring at our own feet as our feet inexplicably slip off the track. The only way to stay on track is by looking toward your ultimate goal: you helping people solve some problem in return for them repaying you fairly for the time and effort you put into it.

That's really the simplest definition of business. The details are not your business. The facts and the tips and the tools are not your business either. They're merely the steps you take to get to that point in the distance. And the more you take that to heart, the more easily you'll stay on the track toward your goal.