A Competitive Edge

Boy, does it take a lot of effort to best the competition? Talent and hard work get pushed to extremes, just to get a small step up.  The typical difference between the best and the runner up is only ten percent.

How do you capitalize on a ten percent advantage? That takes salemanship. It's a difficult balancing act. If you overstate your ten percent advantage, there can be misunderstanding. Your honesty can come into question and you could be branded a bragger. Understating your edge will not get you noticed. You will fall into the crowd of the also ran, despite all your extra effort to achieve a higher position.

The more competitive the enviroment, the more things can get stretched to capture attention.  Authors have to be edgy, speakers have to say something controversial, entertainers must display pizazz! The audience has a short attention span.  People are busy and don't like to waste time with the trivial ordinary.  It takes something abnormal to catch their attention.

It's got to be a red hot spark to ignite the fuel in a high compression environment. If you can get their engine started, they will spend another five seconds looking closer.  You have to risk being edgy in order to publicize your edge.

There are few experts in the world. Most of us have a broad knowledge of several subjects. Not many run very deep on any particular thing. Generalists are going to have trouble differentiating ten percent in most subject matter. To the casual observer, there is no apparent difference. What incentive do they have to choose the better option, if they can't tell the difference?

I love Amazon for this reason. They have found a way to make it so easy to compare products. I feel like an informed consumer for nearly every purchase I make. They have a quick visual rating system for the busy bodies, and you can read reviews for more detailed information. I am mostly ignorant of the variety of goods that I want to purchase. They found ways to make learning easy and quick.

When learning is not so easy and quick, it takes a commitment of time to the subject. Sometimes salesmanship is best directed at that objective: getting the customer interested in learning more. If you have the superior product and your customer arrives at that conclusion on their own, it is far more impactful than giving them the raw data up front.

Salesmanship is educational. How can you help your subjects to learn? Many people are resistant to learning. They are too busy and have higher priorities. When I detect that situation, I suggest that they make the simple comparison on price.

Price is a relatively easy comparison to make. Establish an even quantifiable measure and compare how much you get for the same dollar. It could be mass, weight, or pieces that you get in return. All other factors deemed equal, why not try to stretch your dollar? We all want the most for the money.

In the case of matching prices, we have a dilemna. We have to compare the next value contributing factor: Quality. This is often a little more difficult. Sometimes it takes a little expert knowledge to discern a ten percent difference in quality.

Most people don't have the capacity to become experts in every subject that they shop. Educational salesmanship takes a lot of added effort. Is it worth it?

It took extraordinary effort, sometimes extreme effort to achieve a competitive edge. Why not make the extra effort it takes to commmunicate that?