Differential Advantage Is More Than The Lowest Price
Jul 13th, 2010 by David Svet
Regular readers of SPURspectives know that Spur Communications provides marketing services for financial services and community benefit organizations. We are routinely asked to help with brand development. So, we spend a lot of time asking why — Why do you exist? Why do you matter? Why should someone care? As you can imagine, our nonprofit friends in the community benefit sector love this exercise. The bankers? Not so much.
In fact, it probably cost us an account with a regional bank recently. We lead clients through some tough soul searching in order to discover their differential advantage in their market. It helps us to understand the things that their customers love about them that are unique to them. It works great. But this time was different. This time when we talked to the room full of bankers about their differential advantage in the market as a reflection of their purpose in the world we got blank stares. When we pressed on about the importance of identifying your market positioning they continued to stare. Finally, after a lengthy and somewhat awkward meeting one of the senior executives muttered half to himself that their difference is rates — banking is about having the best rates. We did not get the account.
The firm that got the account has developed a fine corporate identity system for them and produced a comprehensive series of multi-channel ad campaigns. All things that I wish we were doing for the bank, but we soldier on with all of the other accounts that we are very happy to serve. In doing so, we discovered something very curious about our non-client and now competitor bank. In spite of all of the effort and expense of their rebranding and self-promotion, their market positioning remains the same and their financial position does as well.
The reason for the lack of change is that they are saying the same thing that they were saying before all of the changes. They always promoted rates and only rates. They continue to do so. They are locked in a race to the bottom. In their world, the bank with the lowest rates and the lowest overhead wins. That works for some folks, but not most. The ones that it works for aren’t loyal either. They’re rate shoppers. In an always connected world, rate shopping is a breeze and requires no human interaction. Loyalty requires a relationship. Relationships require caring. To care someone needs to understand why. Why do you exist? Why do you matter? Why should I care?
If you have great answers to these questions, chances are you are a market leader.
Image by HedgeAccording.ly is licensed under a Creative Commons 3.0 United States License.
It does come down to those 3 simple questions, doesn’t it? It doesn’t matter what type of brand you are creating, that is the essence of what you are looking at. It is all about ‘why’.
Thanks for the simple frame. I have been working on developing my brand and this was some real helpful clarity.
And hey, someday that bank might realize that it is all about ‘why’ and they’ll come calling.
Thanks Zan. Yes, it is simple and very powerful once realized. Everybody knows what there company does, some even know how they do it. Most companies haven’t considered why they do it. Answering that question opens up a whole new world for those who figure it out.
David