Unique Strengths (Let the Big Dogs Eat)

Unique strengths are features of products that only your company offers. Use them to identify sales opportunities where you can out-value the competition. If competitors invest a lot of selling efforts with customers whose goals connect to your unique strengths, you will still receive the orders. Competitors' only short-term defense against your unique strengths is to lower their prices to the point at which price becomes the customer's only consideration.

Fortunately, no company can afford to lose money on every sale. Even not-the-sharpest-knife-in-the-drawer competitors eventually get smart and start looking for other places to sell. Fighting losing battles with you gets old quick. Unfortunately, competitors also have unique strengths—and the sword cuts both ways. You need to know your competitors' unique strengths and how to counterbalance or avoid them. (You will learn techniques for doing this in subsequent chapters.)

Note

Even if customers show your proposal containing unique strengths to existing suppliers, they will only enhance the value of your offer. Competitors will take a double hit: They will be forced to acknowledge that your measurable benefits are real and that they can't achieve them.