Competitive differentiation is something people like us think about often. After all, much of our sales and/or relationship management activity takes place within a competitive environment. 

We may be seeking to beat a competitor in a new business pursuit, unseat an established incumbent, or experience a competitor attempting to displace us as an incumbent. 

Over the years, we have probably positioned our differentiation in several different – and flawed – forms:

• Products/solutions: Many sales and relationship management professionals attempt to demonstrate superiority in products and solutions. The problem? Product differentiation is difficult to establish. In many cases, the competition is strong and believes just as firmly in their solutions. This can leave the customer confused and unable to discern clear differences between offerings.
• Low-cost position: Most of the people who read this are value leaders who cannot effectively compete on the basis of low cost – or don’t want to.
• Technical and operational excellence: Like product differentiation, it is hard to establish technical or operational superiority, and challenging to distinguish from the customer’s viewpoint. 

At this point, true differentiation sounds challenging at best. So, what’s left? Something that can be our most powerful and effective differentiation: us, and how we sell and manage customer relationships. This includes:

• How we take an interest in others – how we ask questions and listen to the answers.
• Our intellectual curiosity – how we work to truly understand what is being said, and what is not being said.
• Our creativity – how we look at a situation and see solutions or opportunities that others might not see.
• Our relationship-building efforts – how we work to build trust, not just rapport, and how we constantly look to strengthen our network.
• Our courage – how we challenge gatekeeper situations, strive to get to decision makers even though it’s not easy, and push back against the rules of engagement when they limit our ability to win. 

 In the end, what we do and how we do it matters a great deal. We can be our most powerful competitive differentiation!