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vangogh
06-10-2009, 07:09 PM
To me this is perhaps the most essential question you need to answer if you want to have a successful business.

I came across a post, How To Make Potential Customers Pick You Over ‘The Other Guys’ (http://freelancefolder.com/get-customers-to-pick-you/), which aims to help you answer the question and then how to convey your uniqueness to potential customers.

The post offers 10 questions to ask yourself to discover your uniqueness, though in all honesty I don't think they're necessarily the best things to look for to discover what makes you different.

Here are the first 3 questions:

1. Are you more experienced?
2. Are you quicker?
3. Do you have better customer service?

The rest are similar. I'm not sure how unique you become by having experience or providing better customer service. Those seem to me things your customers are going to expect. While I don't care for the specific questions to discover your uniqueness I do agree very much in the idea.

I do like the 10 ways the posts suggests to convey your uniqueness. I'll let you check out the post to see what they are.

Let me share a bit of my own experience. As most of you know I offer web design/development services. So do millions of others. Why should someone hire me. While I always felt I did a good job, charged a fair price, offered friendly services, etc., none of that is really enough to separate my services from everyone else.

As many of you also know I've spent a lot of time learning how search engines and search engine optimization work. At first I thought I should simply offer those services, but that just put me in another industry of many with no way to distinguish myself.

But by combing the two and offering seo design I do start to separate myself. SEO became more a way to stand out as a web designer and so helps make me more unique.

Taking things further I work with WordPress a lot. First it was on my blog, then it was for other people's blogs. As I learned more about WordPress I could see it was more than blogging software and able to serve as a full CMS. I started putting more client sites on WordPress and becoming an expert in WordPress. Now it's another way to make my business unique.

There are many, many web designers. By using seo as a selling point I'm now competing with less of the. Adding WordPress to the mix has me competing with even less. I'm certainly not the only web designer who knows seo and works with WordPress, but both do make me much more unique than your typical web designer.

By no coincidence, the more I make myself unique the more my business has grown.

How are you separating your business from the competition? If someone asked you why they should hire you instead of someone else what would you tell them?

huggytree
06-10-2009, 08:10 PM
having great service is unusual in my business.

i give estimates either on the spot or within 8 hours....my competition takes a week
when i make a mistake i show up within 4 hours...my competition takes a week+

i think every business must have a unique idea which appeals to the widest range of people, but still not be generic.

my unique idea is better products and near perfect service...very few plumbers do it.. most are chasing after being the lowest price right now..whenever i talk w/ the competition they are always amazed at the high quality parts i use...they cost extra money....but it gives me something to bash the other guy with when i show up to bid...'i use this part, the other guys all use that one, mine is better because of 'X' , my installation method is better because of 'X'


ive rarely had a customer ask how much experience i have...when dealing with unusual situations i make sure i let them know ive done it before.....acting professional usually says 'i have experience'

vangogh
06-11-2009, 12:12 AM
I guess in some industries good customer service and the like are enough to make you unique. That makes sense. And having good service will certainly get you recommendations and word of mouth. I was thinking of it in the sense how most businesses will list customer service as a selling point so it becomes something you have to say instead of it being something that marks you as unique from the competition. Actually delivering on the promise can of course set you apart.

You do manage to stand out by selling high end and using quality products and offering quality service. That definite does make you more unique. It also leads you in who you want to market to since we know some people are only concerned with the price.


every business must have a unique idea which appeals to the widest range of people

I agree, though I would qualify the word widest. I think it depends on the type of business. Some businesses only need a handful of clients or customers to be successful. You might only need to appeal to a few hundred people in order to have enough business consistently coming in. But it does make sense to cast the net as wide as you can.

Patrysha
06-11-2009, 01:25 AM
From that list I have to say the two that resonate with me are a combination of #8 having a unique reputation and #10 having specialized knowledge

There just aren't many people out there who have gone the range of specialties that I have :-) It's quite possible that I am the only one in the world with the same mix and the ability to put it all together. Not that I am an expert in any of the fields that I have dabbled in, but I was (and am) successful and skilled enough in each area to be an asset to my clients - better than they could do on their own and less expensive than any specialist with a comparable skill level. Which works perfectly now that I've narrowed down my niche to small independently owned businesses :-)

I learned over the last year that I do not do well when instructions come from the owner through a department manager - too many headaches!!

Unless the project is one of my co-promotion efforts like the one I have been working on for the summer...but that's because it's all my ideas and I am in charge and the businesses are just buying in for a share of the co-op and aren't actually telling me what to do beyond supplying their information.

vangogh
06-11-2009, 03:06 AM
It's quite possible that I am the only one in the world with the same mix and the ability to put it all together

Which of course means that anyone needing your special mix is naturally going to hire you. You get the job because of your uniqueness.

I'd agree with you on #8 and #10 from the list, though as huggy pointed out which one will work best for you does depend on your industry. If your industry is typically slow to finish the job then being quicker is certainly a great way to separate yourself. If your industry is good at delivering very fast then it's not going to help you stand out.

Spider
06-11-2009, 09:09 AM
Frankly, I thought this article was quite outdated. It's the sort of thing that was prevalent about twenty/thirty years ago and much of it does not apply today. I suggest anyone who reads that article and sees their own success written there actually analyze their business and see what is really driving their success. Being unique is probably not the cause.

I don't believe customers/clients go around looking for businesses that are unique. In fact, most customer/clients couldn't care less whether you are unique or not.

Patrysha
06-11-2009, 09:35 AM
Customers never care about you except in the context of what you can do for them. That has not changed since the beginning of time.

The foundations of good business and marketing don't change with the wind. Tactics and strategies change, but the elements of building a solid business don't. So even advice that existed 20-30 years ago can be relevant...

Spider
06-11-2009, 10:56 AM
But people's attitudes and circumstances change, Patrysha, and technology changes. Thirty years ago cold calling was a legitimate sales technique and, for me and many others, an extremely successful one. Today, what with auto-responders, answering machines, digital menus, longer working hours and caller ID, cold calling is an almost impossible way to sell product. Selling brushes and vaccuum cleaners door-to-door was good business once, but not anymore. Today we have social media and online forum, that did not exist thirty years ago.

You are right when you say Customers do not care about you except in the context of what you can do for them. However, the foundations of good business and marketing do change over time as peoples' attitudes, needs and desires change, because what people care about changes and what people need you to do for them changes.

Patrysha
06-11-2009, 11:16 AM
I think we agree with each other, but are just talking in different terms.

Cold calling & Email (to me) are channels of communication - that's about getting the message out. Those are the final steps in the marketing process, about making the sale.

Foundations (to me) are things like product knowledge, customer service, understanding the needs and expectations of the target market, building a relationship...those things are the things that don't change over time.

Channels change, foundations don't - that's my perspective.

Spider
06-11-2009, 11:36 AM
Sure, I agree there, Patrysha. My beef was with an article that touted Uniqueness as the answer to a successful business:- ...It’s more important now than ever to differentiate your freelancing business from other freelancing businesses. Differentiating your business is the key to winning clients from competitors. To do this, you must first discover what sets your freelancing business apart from similar businesses. Once you discover what’s unique about your freelancing business you must express that information clearly and frequently to your customers and prospective customers....

...when it seems eminently clear to me that uniqueness is immaterial. I don't think prospective customers search for businesses that are unique. I know I do not search out businesses that are unique? Is there anyone here who does that for their own purchases?

In fact, focusing on one's uniqueness appeals only to those people who want that particular unique attribute - a necessarily narrow range of people, in most cases. Most people wanting help with public relations, for example, want a firm that is competent at public relations and I would expect every firm in that arena would claim to be that.

vangogh
06-11-2009, 12:25 PM
Frederick I think you're focusing too much on the word unique in a way it wasn't intended. The idea is you need to be able to offer a reason why you over the competition. If everything you do is exactly what your competition does then you're leaving it up to a coin toss as to whether you get the job.

Again the question the post and this thread is discussing is


Why Should Someone Choose You Over The Competition

And in order to answer that question you have to find something different about your business that resonates with the customer. Maybe unique is not the best word, but I think the article is spot on in regards to answering the above question.

It's not that potential customers set out to search for something unique. It's that a potential customers having searched and found several companies that might all serve their needs need to see something in one of those companies that differentiates it from the others. If you happen to be one of several companies a person is considering and you look just like all the others why should that person hire you? You're leaving it to chance.

Spider
06-11-2009, 04:45 PM
Gosh! I didn't think I was focusing on the term, VG. Counting words like different, differentiate, set apart and unique, there were 21 mentions of uniqueness in this article. Seems to me the author was focusing on it - indeed, that is precisely what the article was about. The two sub-titles were - Discover What’s Unique About Your Freelancing Business, and How To Convey Your Uniqueness.

I agree that the main question posed was - Why Should Someone Choose You Over The Competition? The only answer offered was, Be Unique. My contention is that this is not the only answer and is, in today's world, a minor part of one's attraction, which can even be detrimental.

If one was to follow this advice of Ms.Spencer - that of discovering one's uniqueness and then making it part of your central business message - you would be appealing to a minority of your prospects and sidetracking the majority. To use your words, VG, a potential customer having searched and found several companies that might all serve their needs, must see something in one of those companies that differentiates it from the others. What might that be? I put it to you that if 50 people searched for your company and chose your company over the others they found, there would be 50 different reasons for having chosen you. Had you focussed on one or two "unique" qualities, many of those 50 would have passed you by because they were not looking for those qualities, or those qualities you thought so important were not important to them. A quality that you had but did not broadcast (because you were focussing on something else) could have gone unnoticed by a prospect wanting (but not necessarily looking for) that quality.

If you happen to be one of several companies a person is considering and you look just like all the others why should that person hire you? You're leaving it to chance. I don't agree that you are leaving it to chance. Because companies do not look all alike. They all have a matrix of qualities - maybe several hundred qualities at various levels. Each company will be different simply by being a separate company. As soon as you accent one or two particular qualities, the others get played down and people for whom those qualites are important will choose another company. Even though you would have been perfectly able to provide the service and indeed have the quality the customer was looking for. They didn't see that quality because you didn't accentuate it, and so you lose them.

You lose them by the very act of trying to attract them.

Like I said, this is an old philosophy that has long since been passed over.

In my opinion, of course.

vangogh
06-11-2009, 06:43 PM
I don't believe it's an old philosophy at all. I believe it's just as relevant today as it was yesterday as it will be tomorrow.

True the word unique is mentioned quite a lot and perhaps it wasn't the best choice of words. Still I don't think the idea is to be unique just for the sake of being different from everyone else. The point is to differentiate yourself from your competition in some way.


Had you focussed on one or two "unique" qualities, many of those 50 would have passed you by because they were not looking for those qualities

That's actually the point. Try as you might you can't appeal to everyone. All 50 of those people are not hiring you no matter what you do. If you're exactly like everyone else there's an excellent chance none of them will hire you. Or at best you leave it to chance since there's no compelling reason to choose you over your competition.

But those 50 people are not all looking for exactly the same thing. And if you can highlight why you're different and dare I say unique then the 2 people in that 50 who are looking for your difference will hire you. You have much better odds by appealing very strongly to a small group of people than you do being a generic in front of millions.

A simple example. I searched for the phrase "web design services" with the quotes in Google. 1.9 million results were returned. The odds of my being hired by someone searching that phrase (assuming they could even find me) is close to nil. Change the search to 'web design services boulder colorado' and there are 18 results, though sadly not me since I didn't include my location on the relevant page. I would have a much better chance of appealing to someone looking for a web design in boulder.

It's true that focusing solely on Boulder probably means excluding some people from other areas (those specifically looking to hire someone in St. Louis for example), but focusing on Boulder doesn't mean someone outside this area would never hire me. However, focusing on location means I will appeal much more to a smaller segment of my market, which increases the odds of being hired by that segment.

You can try all you like, but you aren't going to appeal to everyone. If you differentiate yourself from the competition you do appeal to a certain segment of your market. True it's a smaller market, but your odds of closing a sale increase greatly.

Spider
06-11-2009, 07:32 PM
...I put it to you that if 50 people searched for your company and chose your company over the others they found, there would be 50 different reasons for having chosen you....
...Try as you might you can't appeal to everyone. All 50 of those people are not hiring you no matter what you do. ...
I accept your argument, VG - don't agree with it, but I see no point in pursuing the difference of opinion. I respond only to point out that you are not comparing like with like.

I spoke of 50 people who "chose your company over the others they found."

You spoke of 50 people as everyone who searched for a web designer.

huggytree
06-11-2009, 09:28 PM
""I don't believe customers/clients go around looking for businesses that are unique. In fact, most customer/clients couldn't care less whether you are unique or not""




True....most people are cheap and like to buy the lowest quality/lowest priced product...Ala-Walmart and Home Depot....

there's no money there....the money is in the 25% of people who DO want something they cant find elsewhere....Some will pay w/o getting a 2nd bid.. you are the one who is offering it and i want YOU to do it...whatever the price(within reason of course)

the one thing i can come up with right now where being Unique is important to everyone is Resturaunts....Yea for for a cheap $1 menu people go to McDonalds....but for a sit down meal place you must have a theme..a unique idea...if you can give a unique menu for a resonable price you'll be successful.. i travel 30 miles to get the best pizza....and i dont care about the price...its more....not double, but more...i dont care....thats the pizza i want.

huggytree
06-11-2009, 09:30 PM
i think if i polled 50 of my customers what they liked about me that there would be only 4 or 5 different reasons given....not 50

the women would say...wow, just look at him
the men would say....i wish i could be like him...some may say....wow, just look at him too

Patrysha
06-11-2009, 10:52 PM
Oh huggytree that had me laughing out loud.

That's the reason hubby thinks half of my clients choose me...but then he's the one with a classroom full of grade seven students who thought he was lying when he pointed out my picture online when he Googled himself. Why he was Googling himself during class time I have no idea. But evidently the kids were insisting that I was a model and not a real person let alone his wife...

vangogh
06-11-2009, 10:59 PM
Frederick, my bad. I misread your statement. I was way off though, wasn't I? In my defense I had a really long post written and then accidentally searched Google in this tab and lost it all so I tried my best to reconstruct what I had as quickly as possible.

I don't think you would get 50 different reasons. I agree with huggy above. You'd get 4 or 5 reasons, though maybe not the reasons he gave :)

My point is that unless you somehow stand apart from your competition you simply aren't getting business. You have to give people a reason why they should choose you instead of someone else. If you really get 50 different reasons from 50 different people you're doing something wrong. That's leaving things up to chance.

susans
06-12-2009, 04:50 AM
Useful Thread!
Keep the info coming.

Spider
06-12-2009, 10:56 AM
VG, I think you are right about standing out, and in this respect the article was right, too. It is the focus that has me concerned. It is so very easy to focus on the wrong things without realizing it. The article focussed on uniqueness, and I think that was inappropriate.

Example: Ever since Icarus flew too close to the sun, man has wanted to fly and has spent many hours trying to solve this problem. Yet, man can fly. Just jump off the nearest cliff. We have focussed on the problem of flight whereas the problem isn't flying, the problem is hitting the ground too hard!

Every business has a distinct set of attributes. This consists of many - let's say hundreds - of characteristics, and in a small business (a freelance business, in the words of the article) those characteristics are the style, attitude and history of the owner. In my case, I am well-travelled - I have lived, worked and visited 39 different countries. I think that brings a different - a unique - approach to my business coaching. However, if I focus too much on that - make too much of my uniqueness in this regard - I blind potential clients (who see no advantage in that characteristic) to other attributes they might find more meaningful.

One does not have to be unique to stand out. Not every business that is selected by a customer is unique.

vangogh
06-12-2009, 11:20 AM
think you are right about standing out, and in this respect the article was right, too. It is the focus that has me concerned. It is so very easy to focus on the wrong things without realizing it. The article focussed on uniqueness, and I think that was inappropriate.

That's fair. I have a hunch we actually agree on this more than it seems and we're dancing around the word unique. Like I said that might not have been the best choice of words, but I think the article's intent is to see how you are unique in order to determine how you can differentiate yourself and and stand out from your competition.


In my case, I am well-travelled - I have lived, worked and visited 39 different countries. I think that brings a different - a unique - approach to my business coaching. However, if I focus too much on that - make too much of my uniqueness in this regard - I blind potential clients (who see no advantage in that characteristic) to other attributes they might find more meaningful.

That makes sense. What I think the article would suggest (and I know I would) is to find something in your travels that resonates with your market. Maybe they don't care that you've traveled a lot, but I would think they'd like that you have experience. Then the traveling becomes something you use to back up the point that you have experience.

Maybe not the best example, but I think that's the spirit of the article.

I think a lot of people new to business really don't know how to figure out what sets them apart and I think this article was looking for a way to help them figure it out. One way to do that is to look at what makes you unique as a way to see what can make your business different from the next one.

Ad-Vice_Man
06-15-2009, 10:32 AM
This is really about definining "who you are" as opposed to "how you differ". Don't get me wrong, by defining who you are you'll definately be differentiating yourself. Take an example of Huggy (sorry huggy if I get some facts wrong).

Huggy Tree Plumbing - High Quality High Service Remodeling and New Construction Plumbing.

vangogh
06-15-2009, 10:53 AM
I think the how you differ part is still important. If who you are is the same as everyone else I'm not sure how that's going to give people the compelling reason to choose you over them. I do get your point though and agree a lot of this is about defining who you are. However I do think you need to find the ways you are different from your competition.

Ad-Vice_Man
06-15-2009, 11:13 AM
I think the how you differ part is still important. If who you are is the same as everyone else I'm not sure how that's going to give people the compelling reason to choose you over them. I do get your point though and agree a lot of this is about defining who you are. However I do think you need to find the ways you are different from your competition.

Except that everyone of us is individually unique in some way, and hopefully that reflects into our business... so while you and I may do the same "thing" the way we do it, the relationships with our customers will be different.

You know?

vangogh
06-15-2009, 11:49 AM
I agree. I know by defining who you are some differences will come out. I just think you have to be able to understand what those differences are and which would be important to potential clients/customers. And I think you need to emphasize it. You can't just know you're going to be different in some way and leave it up to others to find out after working with you.

The whole point is that prior to someone choosing to do business with you, if you look from the outside like everyone else in your industry why should someone choose to do business with you. Unless you're giving them a reason you're leaving things up to chance. You need to figure out what differentiates you and then make sure to get that differentiation across to people who are thinking of doing business with you. You can wait to let them discover it after they've chosen you, but then they might never choose you to find out.

Spider
06-15-2009, 02:58 PM
I wonder if we are all looking at this from the wrong side. We are looking at it as how can we differentiate ourselves from our competition, even if that is no more than defining who we are. Yet, if we focus on our own uniqueness/differentiation, then "who-we-are" defines our target market. I suggest that "who we are" is far less important than "what we can do."

Eg. If I make too much of being well-travelled, I attract potential clients who think, "a well-travelled businessman makes a better coach," and I get a disproportionate number of inquiries from such people. Other prospects don't approach me because they think (perhaps) that all that travelling about the place distracted me and thus I have less to offer them than a business coach who gained all his experience in one state, or at least in one country. I, effectively, limit my target market by trying to differentiate myself from my competition.

What if we forget the competition and focus on our own abilities and what we offer, and not try to "sell" ourselves based on the fact that we are not our competition.

Following this train of thought, I suggest we ought to define our market, not broadly but in as much detail as will reduce the size of the market to what we can handle. Then decide what that narrow market wants and how we can satisfy it.

Eg. My target is small business owners, but not all small business owners - I can do best for small business owners who have been in business for a couple of years and want to expand - a business in or allied to the construction industry that has 3 - 5 employees.

Under this hypothesis, I would determine precisely what such clients need and show how I can provide that. I would do it in such a way that would appeal to construction businesses, but without being so "unique" that other, non-construction people would be turned away. Now, I'll bet there are not many other business coaches so experienced in the construction industry - this certainly differentiates me, but yet would alienate non-construction businesses as being unrelated to their needs.

Surely, the best course of action would be for me to not bother myself with what my competition offers - instead, I will focus on who my market is, what they want and describe as best I can how I can provide it. My differentiation would come, not in the fact that I gained a lot of experience in the construction industry, but in the fact that I understand my prospects problem (whatever it is) and can solve it.

What do you think?

vangogh
06-15-2009, 04:13 PM
we ought to define our market, not broadly but in as much detail as will reduce the size of the market

I think that's really what this comes down to. You look at how you are different from the competition in order to do two things. Stand out from them and better define your market. When I started this thread I used my own business as an example. When I moved from general web design and development to WordPress design and development that helped me stand apart from all the designers/developers who don't know WordPress and it also refined my market from anyone wanting a website to those wanting a WordPress driven website.

It doesn't disqualify me from those people who don't want to use WordPress, but it does make me a more attractive choice for those that do.


if we focus on our own uniqueness/differentiation, then "who-we-are" defines our target market. I suggest that "who we are" is far less important than "what we can do."

Interesting point. What I took from the article was that you were looking for your uniqueness/differentiation in order to understand how you can refine your business for your market. It was never about figuring out who you are as it was figuring out what your uniqueness/differentiation offers to your market.

Frederick in your case I'd look at how being well-traveled fits in with what a segment of your market wants. Maybe it's the idea of being more experienced or having knowledge of many cultures and markets. Maybe it gives you an edge when it comes to coaching businesses that are more international. Just tossing out thoughts of course. Being well traveled becomes your proof rather than the actual selling point. I'm sure there's a way to spin the fact of being well traveled with something that can set you apart from other business coaches in a way that a part of your overall market is looking for.

Dan Furman
06-15-2009, 05:42 PM
Been away for a few days...

Anyway, to me, this is one of those classic "things" that is said, without much meat behind it. I mean, going by the advice, you'd have all 20 plumbers in town trying to find that thing that makes them different in a way that would sway people. Really, are there even 20 things that would be the decider in choosing one? We have price, quality, showing up... what else is there (assuming they are after the same markets)? And what kind of real difference is it, anyway - I mean, everyone says they do quality work.

You can make yourself unique by targeting different markets, and we've already had some discussion on that. But again, that can hurt you, too. For example, I mostly write websites for people who offer a service. But I do enough product ones (and do them well) that I'm not looking to mention that. Because mentioning one (as a difference maker) automatically lessens the other somewhat.

I think, aside from targeting the market or services offered, the "difference" is something that's either obvious (storefront, an artists work, writing, etc), or is earned (reputation).

I think this "trying to find something unique" is, in and of itself, overrated.

vangogh
06-15-2009, 07:54 PM
you'd have all 20 plumbers in town trying to find that thing that makes them different in a way that would sway people.

I don't think all 20 would be looking to differentiate, which means the one or two that do differentiate themselves have a good chance of gaining the extra business. But let's consider out resident plumber, huggy. He does differentiate himself by dealing in high end. I don't think you have to be different from every other business in your industry, but to offer some kind of differentiation from the generic. In being high end huggy eliminates some potential customers, but at the same time stops competing with some of the other plumbers in the area.

To me this all still comes down to answering the question


Why should I buy something from you instead of from your competition?

To answer that question you have to differentiate yourself from the competition in some way. If you're exactly the same as your competition aren't you leaving things to chance?

Dan Furman
06-15-2009, 10:46 PM
In being high end huggy eliminates some potential customers, but at the same time stops competing with some of the other plumbers in the area.

To me this all still comes down to answering the question


Why should I buy something from you instead of from your competition?

To answer that question you have to differentiate yourself from the competition in some way. If you're exactly the same as your competition aren't you leaving things to chance?

See, this is where I think it breaks down. You're more or less talking about marketing / target market than uniqueness.

Huggy, by being high end, does not really differentiate himself from the competition (in an "all plumbers" way) - in a sense, he just goes after a different market within plumbing. His using higher end parts and charging what he does is the thing that allows his market to identify him from the schlock.

That's a big difference if you really think about it. To me, that "why should I pick you?" uniqueness has to go beyond the surface. It has to be apples to apples - what differentiates Huggy from other high end plumbers.... Now we're talking uniqueness. And it's a LOT harder.

This goes back to my first statement about this - this is a classic "say not do" thing. To me, that uniqueness - the way I see it - must be earned in some way. This is where your reputation, your credentials, your experience, etc comes into play. I wrote two books - a big part of the reason was the credential boost it gives me (lord knows I didn't do it for the money :) )

It's easier for some businesses than others. For you and I, our work kind of speaks for itself to a degree - if you want MY style writing, you kind of have to hire ME. For a plumber (etc), it's going to be largely track record. Which takes time.

vangogh
06-16-2009, 02:43 AM
I'm not sure why all the focus on the word uniqueness. I think that was used solely as a means to an end and not the end itself. I don't think the article was trying to say be unique or you won't succeed. I think it's saying you can look at yourself and see where you are unique as a way to answer the question why should someone choose you.

Answering that question is what this thread is all about. One way to do that is to look for what makes you unique and then apply it to narrowing your market and finding something to differentiate you from your competition.

I think by being high end huggy absolutely differentiates himself from all those plumbers who aren't high end and who work solely on price. That leads him to different customers and different marketing. Does it make him absolutely unique from all other plumbers? Of course not. But it does differentiate him from many of his competitors.


His using higher end parts and charging what he does is the thing that allows his market to identify him from the schlock.

How is that not differentiating himself from the schlocks?

Dan Furman
06-16-2009, 04:06 AM
I'm not sure why all the focus on the word uniqueness. I think that was used solely as a means to an end and not the end itself. I don't think the article was trying to say be unique or you won't succeed. I think it's saying you can look at yourself and see where you are unique as a way to answer the question why should someone choose you.

Answering that question is what this thread is all about. One way to do that is to look for what makes you unique and then apply it to narrowing your market and finding something to differentiate you from your competition.

I think by being high end huggy absolutely differentiates himself from all those plumbers who aren't high end and who work solely on price. That leads him to different customers and different marketing. Does it make him absolutely unique from all other plumbers? Of course not. But it does differentiate him from many of his competitors.


His using higher end parts and charging what he does is the thing that allows his market to identify him from the schlock.

How is that not differentiating himself from the schlocks?

It is differentiating. But I think that's more market segment and "where one fits" than something special about the business. I think the real difference, that thing people should strive for, is the comparison within that segment.

I guess I'm looking at it more on a micro / individual level than a macro level - I take the word "competitor" and look at it in a more apples to apples way. First find where you fit and make sure you are positioned there (which is more of what you are talking about), then seperate yourself from THAT competition (because that's your real competition.)

vangogh
06-16-2009, 04:18 AM
I have a feeling we're agreeing on this, but disagreeing over semantics. I think the something special about the business is the sam thing as the where one fits in the market. I'm seeing the two as the same.

For example you're in the widgets industry and everyone sells blue widgets or red widgets. Nothing but those two colors. You realize people sell green widgets and so decide you'll sell green widgets. In fact at first you only sell green widgets and not red or blue. Now everyone who had been wanting a green widget becomes your customer.

You grab a segment of the market by differentiating your business from your competition. Later when you've built a brand you might start offering red and blue widgets or maybe create a line of yellow and orange widgets. The idea though is you were able to break into the widget industry not by competing directly with the existing brands, but by differentiating your business from the existing brands and finding a gap in the market that wasn't being served.

I think that's what the article is about. The answer to why choose your widgets is because you sell green ones when no one else does. That makes you unique and it differentiates you from the competition.

Dan Furman
06-16-2009, 04:25 AM
The answer to why choose your widgets is because you sell green ones when no one else does. That makes you unique and it differentiates you from the competition.

Yea, here's how I'm looking at it - If you sell green ones, and nobody else does, then you have no competition. When somebody else comes along and sells green ones, then you need to differentiate yourself from them. That where the uniqueness comes in.

I like looking at it that way better, because very few businesses can truly be unique from the beginning. Someone else is almost certainly selling green widgets.

Geez, we're up late :)

vangogh
06-16-2009, 12:35 PM
Geez, we're up late

And you're 2 hours ahead of me. I wasn't sure if we were both still up late last night or I was still up last night and you were up early this morning.


very few businesses can truly be unique from the beginning

I'd agree and I do think if you're entering an industry you have to do quite a lot of what is already being done to play a bit of catch up. To me this whole thing keeps coming down to answering the question of why should someone specifically choose you over the competition. Once you're in a crowded industry, which is going to be the case for most of us, you have to find some way to get people to think you offer more or something different from the others in your space. If everyone's the same then the customer's choice really will come down to chance. Or at least you're leaving their choice up to something random.

What I think most businesses need to do is identify things in the market that aren't currently being served and then offer those things in some fashion. If your industry has a reputation for lousy customer service then put a lot into a great customer service experience. Answer the phone quickly, respond to email promptly, live by the idea that the customer is always right and bend over backwards to please him or her. If everyone in your industry offers great customer service then you need to as well, but know it really won't be a selling point.

I think for many it's hard to identify those gaps in the market, which is where the article that started this thread comes in. I think we are all different and we're all unique. Just by being in business we're going to be different from our competition, because we'll never do things exactly the same way they do. But how many of us are aware of how we're different and how many of us realize those differences are exactly what some people are looking for when making a buying decision? I think the idea behind this article is to find what makes you different and unique and again realize there is probably a segment of your market that would choose you if they knew about your difference and uniqueness. So if you can figure out where your uniqueness meets market demand you want to highlight it and refine your business to be more appealing to parts of your market.

Offering more to a smaller group of people will ultimately lead to more business than offering the same to everyone. Unless you have the money to build a brand that extends far and wide you need to offer something the others don't. And I think one way to find what that something extra is, is to see where you are different and emphasize that difference.

Spider
06-26-2009, 09:11 AM
...for many it's hard to identify those gaps in the market...I think this is the whole point. The idea of being unique or being somehow (anyhow?) different from others is misleading. It doesn't really answer the question.

Extolling newcomers to "be unique" or advertise how they are different, has neophyte business owners doing silly things or identifying irrelevant facts. The effort needs to be put into finding the unfulfilled gaps in the marketplace and filling them. Find a need and satisfy it, has always been a basis for business.

That's how you set yourself apart. That is how you gain a foothold and grow your business. Finding a need and satisfying it.

vangogh
06-26-2009, 11:27 AM
Again I don't think the point was to be unique for the sake of being unique. The point was to answer the question why should someone choose you over the competition. That's not always easy to answer. This article attempted to help people answer it by looking at where they are unique as a starting point. At least that was my interpretation. That's certainly one way to begin answering the question.

I realize the article uses the word unique a lot and as I've mentioned several times already it probably isn't the best choice of words. I think the idea is more to differentiate yourself from your competition in some way so that there is a real choice between you.

All good advice can lead people astray and be misleading. Some, if not most, of the responsibility for staying on course lies in the person receiving and applying or rejecting the advice.

If you're in an industry without a lot of competition then simply being in the industry might be enough to get you business. Demand for your services might be more than the supply of businesses offering those services. Most of us, though are in industries where there is a great amount of competition. Supply is more than demand. Unless you already have a strong market position and a fairly well known brand you're not going to be the choice for most people looking for your services unless you can show why you offer something your competition doesn't.

I think that's where the uniqueness idea comes in. And again I don't think it's about being unique for the sake of being unique. It's about finding what you can offer as a business that your competition can't or doesn't. It's the same thing as why businesses will usually look for a niche within the industry once the industry starts to get crowded. You won't stand out in a crowded space by being the same as everyone else. Maybe if you have enough money to market your business more than the rest, but that really isn't going to be the case with small businesses.