missing out on an opportunity

[keannu]

What's the difference between "miss out an opportunity" and "missing out on an opportunity? Does the latter imply losing some benefit from that?

st153
ex)One of my responsibilities is to help recruit new independent agencies to represent our company. In our effort to do this, we sent marketing materials to prospective agencies so they could learn more about us. While we hope most agents read or communications, seldom did we receive any direct replies. After learning about the principle of scarcity, we realized we were missing out on an opportunity that had been in front of us all along!..Understanding how the principle can move people to action, we began to include something like this near the end of our communications: "Each year we have a goal of selecting just a few new agencies to partner with us..."

 

[Amigos4]

Native speakers would never say 'miss out an opportunity'. It does not make sense.

'Missing out on an opportunity' makes more sense but your sentence would be clearer if you simply said '... we realized we were missing an opportunity that had been in front of us all along!

 

[keannu]

Thanks a lot! So "missing out on opportunity" doesn't make much difference from "missing an opportunity"? The dictionary says "missing out on sth" is losing pleasure from it.

 

[Amigos4]

Thanks a lot! So "missing out on opportunity" doesn't make much difference from "missing an opportunity"? The dictionary says "missing out on sth" is losing pleasure from it.

Keannu, take a look at definition #15 at Missing | Define Missing at Dictionary.com . Perhaps BrE uses the expression more often than we do in AmE.

When you say '...we realized we were missing out on an opportunity that had been in front of us all along!' are you implying that you were 'losing pleasure' by not taking advantage of the opportunity? I'm not sure your dictionary definition applies to this situation. What do you think?

Cheers,
A4

 

[emsr2d2]

I missed his birthday party = I did not attend.
I missed out on his birthday party = I was unable to take advantage of a fun occasion.