Unique Core Differentiators (UCDs) clearly articulate what makes your business different. This video tells you how to identify or create one:
Unique Core Differentiators (UCDs) are the special things about your product or service or business that compels customers to buy from you rather than your competitors.
UCDs target real buying concerns, key frustrations and benefits for your customers.
They form the “core” of your business, permeating every area, in order to fulfil the differentiation promise.
UCDs must be communicated in all of your marketing activities in order to work effectively.
Do You Have Any Unique Core Differentiators?
In order to grow your business using UCD’s, think for a few moments about some of the things you think are unique about your business and jot them down for later.
It could be that your business offers better, or more unique product or services. Or perhaps the specific way you deliver the product or service brings better results for your customers. Maybe you offer a better value, or the experience within your team far exceeds the competitors’.
UCDs Are Powerful In Five Ways
UCDs are powerful in five ways:
- They articulate exactly what your customer wants: well-formed differentiators target your customer’s “hot buttons,” real buying concerns, or key frustrations. In one statement it educates them about exactly why they should buy from you.
- They improve the results from your marketing: They make you highlight the “benefits” of your product or service rather than just the “features” in all of your marketing activities.
- They give a specific focus to your team – a consistency of purpose to everyone on your team in the way they present themselves and deal with customers to support what you’ve said differentiates you.
- They improve the operation: They must sit at the “core” of your entire business and the systems you use
- They help increase sales: Brings customers in, keeps them coming back again and again, and builds a referral network—all without ever lowering your prices
Some Examples Of UCDs
Shipping company: “Absolutely, positively overnight” created a point of differentiation among shipping companies for Federal Express. They also had to improve the core of their operation in order to deliver on their promise.
Construction company: “We will pay you $100 for every day we go over the targeted completion date” targets customers’ key frustration with builders…that the deadline is hardly every met.
Grocery store: “The fresh food people” targets customers’ desire for the freshest produce.
- What makes your business different?
Three Types Of UCDs
Unlocking, discovering or creating UCDs in your business can be a key to generating results from your marketing and sales efforts that really grow your business.
When you’re are examining the ways in which your business and what it delivers is unique, remember that there are three types of UCDs:
Actual UCDs
When there is something genuinely unique about your product or service
Example: “Parts Overnight”
The founder of this very successful company realised that it was next to impossible to fix a laser printer overnight…the average turnaround time was 6 weeks. Why? Because only a couple of very large companies carried the spare parts for technicians to order.
Because he guessed that people might like to get their printer fixed sooner than that, he developed a unique way to deliver printer parts overnight to technicians, and offered a guarantee on quality. The technicians are happy because their customers are happy, and the company went from £4,000 to £20 million in just 4 years.
Created UCDs
Did you come up with a list of things that differentiate your product or service from your competitors?
Perhaps you can’t find anything that is truly unique about it. If that’s the case, you’ll need to create a point of differentiation. It helps to examine the WAY you do business rather than just the product or service.
For example:
- A guarantee unlike any other offered in your industry
- A level of after-sales service that surpasses all others
- A unique delivery or installation process
- An 0800 service hotline
Example: Wholesale Baker offers a risk-free guarantee…if the retailer does not sell the baked goods, the baker will buy them back at full price. Captured the majority of the local market because it solved a key customer frustration and gave them a reason to buy from him. They don’t even mind paying a slightly higher price because of the guarantee. He removed his own risk by qualifying the guarantee with “after you’ve paid within 7 days of delivery.”
Perceived UCDs
You may still not have anything in your business that’s totally unique. But if you’re the first to articulate a perceived difference (even though your competitors do the same) you’ll stand out in the crowd as if you are unique.
Examples: Coors Beer tells the story of how their beer is made with water from the freshest springs in the mountains to give it its special taste. When in actuality, Coors is made the same as its competitors’. The only difference is that no one else used it in their marketing.
Mercedes Benz does the same thing with safety.
Finding Your Own UCDs
So get out that list again that you wrote down earlier. Now look at it from your customers’ perspective instead of your own.
- What benefit are you providing?
- What key frustration are you removing?
- What are you willing to go the extra mile on the differentiate yourself?
- What is something that everyone in your industry is required to do, but no one articulates as a UCD?
Add any new UCDs that you come up with to your list.
Making Your UCDs The Core Of Your Business
In Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies James Collins examines the differences between directly competitive companies, and points out that some of them outlast, outperform and outrun the competition. He says these “built to last” companies have a central core that is the basis upon which all business decisions are made…this is what differentiates them.
Once you have established your UCDs, you must then make them a central focus of your business. Your products, services, and the way you operate should all be guided by what you’ve promised in your UCD statements. And when you’re faced with a difficult business decision, you can go back to the “core” for guidance.
Shout Your UCDs From The Rooftop
The final step after you’ve created your UCDs and integrated them into the business is to make them the focus of your marketing efforts. The mistake most businesses make is that they don’t include UCDs in their marketing; they focus on the “features” rather than the benefits, and expect customers to buy just because they are in the marketplace and are saying, “Buy from us.”
Take charge of the situation, and make sure that everything you put into your advertising, promotions, signage, brochures, stationery, delivery vehicles, shopping bags, etc. clearly articulates exactly why you are unique and why potential clients should buy from you.
If you don’t, they’ll make their buying decision based on something else…something that might lead them elsewhere.
Conclusion
Let’s go over the key points.
- Perception is the reality. People buy based on the differences they perceive between competitors.
- You must make your business stand out by developing and communicating your Unique Core Differentiators.
- Unique Core Differentiators (UCDs) are those things that clearly articulate what makes you different, and target customers’ concerns, frustration and desires.
- There are three types of UCDs: Actual, Created and Perceived.
- Once you’ve come up with your UCDs, you need to make sure they are the focus or “core” of your business.
- The final step is to ensure that all of your marketing efforts clearly articulate why you are unique and why customers should buy from you.
An important thing to remember as you are going through these steps is to be completely honest with yourself about your capabilities. You will have trouble feeling comfortable in promoting a story that is fictional, and trouble growing a business whose actions do not support their claims.
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