With so many b-to-b and b-to-c brands vying for attention and business, there’s never been a greater need for true, relevant differentiation among competitive products and services.  

Bombarded with so many choices, tossed at them in so many ways, potential customers are desperately seeking a reason to justify one competitive solution over another.  Yet most marketers fail to deliver a truely differentiated branding effort for their product or service.  Instead, they offer up a similar-but-slightly-different feature/benefit story, seemingly trying to be all things to as many people as possible while in actuality setting their brand to sail on an already cluttered sea of competitive sameness.  

Granted, true differentiation is hard work, but isn’t it worth the effort?

What’s the true difference in comparable healthcare services?  Banks?  Cement brands?  Bottled water?  Competitive software solutions?   Sports shoes?  Activated carbon?  Your brand versus your competitors’? 

(Hint: true differentiation does not lie simply in the cleverness of a great ad campaign, pricing, selection, quality, or customer service.)

Noted marketer and Harvard professor Ted Levitt wrote in his 1991 book, Thinking About Management, “Differentiation is one of the most important stratgic and tactical activities in which companies must constantly engage.”  Hmmm.  Me thinks this man speaketh the truth.  So, what about it?

Long Live The Unique Selling Proposition

Any advertising or marketing professional worth his or her salt remembers Rosser Reeves as the man who formalized the concept of  the “Unique Selling Proposition” in his 1960-published book, Reality in Advertising.  According to Reeves, in order for their USP to be effective, advertisers were required to focus on the single genuine differentiating reason to buy their product or service.  While it still resonates today, many marketers for some reason fail to apply this sage counsel to their branding efforts.

I’ve personally wrestled with identifying and clarifying the USP for many of the brands I’ve worked with in the past, so I know firsthand that it ain’t as easy as Reeves makes it sound.  But it’s ultimately a matter of the success or failure of your brand that you do it.  And do it well.  

In 2001 (and updated in 2008), marketer and author Jack Trout published Differentiate or Die, an excellent read on the need and ways for true differentiation.  He acknowledges that, in our modern era of reverse engineering, lasting product differentiation is tough.  And patent protection only goes so far.  Still, differentiation with the product or service itself is the first thing to consider.  As Trout puts it, “improve, update, or reinvent.”  Improve or add meaningful features – or completely reinvent – to provide a genuine, appreciable point of difference. 

Operating more efficiently and effectively than your competitors is not typically a viable long-term differentiating strategy either, though many brands focus on better customer service, improved communications, etc.  The problem is, though you may enjoy short term gains, competitors will eventually level the playing field.

The key is finding the point of difference that’s uniquely yours compared to whatever your competitors are doing (and you DO have at least one), and doggedly pursue it.  This difference must be genuine, and it must be something of true value to your prospects.  Strategically, this is brand positioning – part of the larger process of crafting a finely honed, sharply defined brand identity.  

In future posts we’ll will offer suggestions for discovering the true point of difference for your brand.  In the meantime, look inward to your brand and outward to the marketing environment and begin thinking about opportunities for true brand differentiation.  Your business depends on it.