Be Different or be dead

June 14, 2010

1 easy way to describe your unique competitive position

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1 easy way to describe your unique competitive position.

It is critical that organizations declare their competitive position in the market in simple, clear and compelling terms.

The fact is, most don’t do it very well. They use vague words and phrases like ‘best’, ‘number one’ and ‘leader’ to describe the differential advantage they believe they have in the market. Words like these do little to give a prospective buyer reasons to do business from them as opposed to others.

Seth Godin says “If you can’t describe your position in 8 words or less, you don’t have a position.”

I agree that a positioning statement is critical, but I think we need to be a little clearer in terms of the competitive element. I would amend Seth’s statement to read “If you can’t define your unique position in 8 words or less, you don’t have a position.”

An 8-word positioning statement that doesn’t deal with how you are unique among your competitors won’t have any impact at all

Winning and survival demands that organizations create unique value differences between themselves and their competitors.

Failure to do so gives customers no compelling reason to do business with them as opposed to others with a predictable end result.

The ONLY Statement is a way to crystallize your uniqueness; it captures the essence of your business plan in terms of how you intend to differentiate your organization from your competitors.

This claim is the ultimate manifestation of differentiation, a rallying cry for the organization and the guiding light for all marketing communications activity.

Complete the sentence: “We are the ONLY ones that…” and you have a positioning statement that works.

Example of an ONLY statement..

MUG Solutions of Vancouver, Canada:

“We provide the only permanent solution that prevents biohazard contaminants (such as used syringes) and all other debris from entering manholes.”

Cheers,
Roy
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• Posted 6.14.10 at 01:00 pm by Roy Osing
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