The Internet has changed how people buy stuff. A few years ago, if you owned a hardware store, your only competition was the other hardware store in your neighborhood. All you needed to do to attract new business was having friendlier staff, lower prices or to send coupons in Sunday’s newspaper.
But now, you’re competing against every other hardware store in the world, so better customer service, lower prices and better promotions just don’t cut it anymore. You might claim that your products are better and your customer service is better, but even if you’re right that’s the exact same thing 500 other companies are claiming.
People talk about things that are different. Not better, but different. Seth Godin wrote a book called Purple Cow, in which he explains that nobody talks about a cow that is a little heavier, or a little taller, but everyone would tell their friends if they saw a purple cow.
Just to be clear: one-upping your competition doesn’t make you different. Do you know how many companies failed trying to build “a social network just like Facebook but with an additional feature that will change the game”? Facebook took off because it was something new, something different.
This video illustrates the way most entrepreneurs want to differentiate from their competitors.
Remember: one-upping your competition doesn’t make you different in your customers’ minds.
Examples of Companies that Are Truly Unique
In Prague, Czech Republic, there’s an ice bar. I was there two weeks ago and every person in town was talking about the ice bar. There’s nothing different about the rest of the club: music, drinks and people dancing. But because there’s an ice bar, this club is always full.
In Portland, where I live, there are several doughnut stores, but only one that always has a 50-person line (even at 2am): Voodoo Doughnuts. Their doughnuts look unlike any other doughnut you’ve seen before, and that’s why people talk about them.
In Vegas there’s a restaurant called Dick’s Last Resort where the waiters are very rude to you. When I went with my friends, the waiter came over, threw the silverware on our table and said “set up your table. I’ll come back to take your order when I feel like it.” We had an amazing time and laughed the whole time as these waiters were trying really hard to be mean. When you search for the name of the restaurant on Google Images, you can see that thousands of people have been posting comments and images about this place. And this is because they’re different, not better.
How Can You Be Unique?
Two years ago I developed a framework to take any business model (no matter how boring) and turn it into something unique. Basically you make a list of all the assumptions in a given industry, and then you come up with different ways to challenge those assumptions. This is an example of how this framework can be used for a restaurant. Keep in mind that the goal of a brainstorming session is to come up with as many ideas as you can, no matter how stupid they are. All you need is one great idea and in my experience, you need at least 10-20 ideas to come up with a great one.
Feel free to post your ideas on how to make your business unique and I’ll be happy to give you my feedback.