This world works revolving around values.

It’s quite an interesting concept, and when I talk with my buddy, I realize that at the end of the day, the one who will ace the “world” game has patterns that are quite intriguing.

They know how to play with values.
They understand the value of their time spent, and they know what the future value of something will be.

When they know that, they focus on the long-term game — continuous and never-ending self-development. They focus on the “trajectory” of their value in the long run.

It’s always the same pattern, it’s never about speed, but about faith and direction in what they have for the long run.

When I step back to understand how the world works, let me give you an easy example, If you give one bean a price equivalent to a house, you’ll say that bean is super-duper expensive. Why? Because you’ve placed the value of a bean over the price of a house. In your mind, you could buy 10 million beans for the cost of a house.

Yes, the concept of value versus price — if something is overvalued, it will likely discourage people from engaging with it. The concept of money is like a unit or a database that represents how much power you can leverage to make a transaction.

Money is only useful if it can facilitate a transaction that adds value to you. For example, using your credit card to finance a lavish lifestyle isn’t a smart transaction — it depletes your resources without adding long-term value. But using your credit card to invest in your future? That’s when money becomes a tool for growth.

A wise person understands the value of every transaction they make.

But what if there was a house priced at just one bean? People would rush to buy the house because they understand the value of the house, but the price is set to just one bean.

It’s that simple, isn’t it? Money flows to what’s undervalued in an intersubjective agreement.

The key idea is that the person who’s acing the game is the one who knows that every decision they make is fundamentally about the value exchanged.

Bring back the conservative & old method on building business

If you’re an entrepreneur, your focus is always on creating added value through your service or product, until the price is below the added value of what you offer.

Imagine, as a customer, paying 50 K IDR for a plate of lasagna, yet the service, product, presentation, and overall experience feel like they’re worth 200K IDR. I bet there would be thousands of customers flocking to your business. Then, what about the opportunity to make money? If people perceive the value as 200 K IDR, why not charge 200K IDR? This would align the price with the value.

Here’s the thing: when you play in the mass/retail market, sometimes quantity with lower business margins works better. It’s not about discounting your cost of goods sold (COGS) for the service, but about adding value to it. The gap between the 200K IDR perceived value and the 50K price is 150K — that’s the worth of the value that customers receive as a marketing incentive. They’ll proudly share their experience with their friends and network.

Now, congratulations, you’ve gained five more customers from one.

And it repeats exponentially.

It’s not about discounting your COGS & OPEX but adding value until it’s below the perceived value. And your loss isn’t because of your burn rate, but because you traded off the value-over-price concept by using the added value as a marketing fee.

Let’s return to the traditional way businesses used to work, the startup “burn rate” model only works in a winner-takes-all game. But if you’re not someone with unlimited capital, I recommend playing the conservative way — the undervalued pricing game.

But after writing this, it makes me think twice..

is it a matter of true value, or is it all about perceived value?

You decide.