by Jay Abraham

I never cease to be amazed, or, more appropriately, saddened, by the fact that many business owners and professionals allow themselves to be typecast in the role of an undistinguished, uninteresting commodity. The world would like us all to be relegated to the status of commodities, because then we'd all have to sell on price alone.

You don't have to fall into that suffocating trap. Just remember the first rule of business -- "There are no rules."

You have the right and obligation to the well-being of your enterprise, your family, your finances and your customers to position and promote your enterprise in a way that clearly differentiates and distinguishes you uniquely and beneficially ahead of everyone that you compete against!

Your opportunity is to present your product or service in such a unique and advantageous way that it is incomparably superior to the production or service of all your competitors. Doing that will free you from the straightjacket of copycat pricing. It will let you set your own price. It will help you throw off the chains of being seen as nothing more than a "commodity."

What does all of this mean in practical terms? It means that whatever it is you normally do--or whatever your industry normally does--you can decide to do better. Let's say that you're retailing books. You've got a book store. You are competing against independents and chains. The chains have pricing advantage and selection advantage over you and, in all likelihood, mammoth facilities. So they have theoretically three advantages.

However, you can make all of their advantages disadvantages, if you offer two things those competitors don't offer: Number one, interactive consultative support and advice with your customers, free of charge. Number two, a more inviting and stimulating environment to shop in and enjoy.

Let's talk about consultants first. Keep in mind, the biggest challenge people have today is using their time expediently. Time is a priceless commodity. If you have knowledgeable salespeople who extend themselves in an authoritative way to assist, guide, recommend and expand the knowledge and the awareness of your customers, you immediately distinguish yourself in a way the big chains can't. They pay nominal salaries to nondescript employees who basically tend to be watching the time clock, eager to get off and get on with their own personal lives. But if you employ passionate men and women who are authoritatively committed to serving as advisors, that in itself will transform the dynamics and the dimension of your bookstore.

And if you make the shop a stimulating, joyous and inviting environment, people will much prefer buying from you instead of your competitors.

Treat Your Customers as Guests

How do you make a bookstore stimulating and inviting? Well, the first thing you do is make everyone who works for you recognize that every customer walking in is like a guest in a hotel.

Your people should be "welcoming" and should use enormous efforts to help customers and share information with them about authors. They should make the process of selecting a book one of the most stimulating and dimensional pleasures a prospective customer has ever encountered.

The environment in your bookstore should be extremely conducive. That means pleasant music. That could mean serving free coffee or other beverages. That could mean having a section of the store allocated to your own reviews of books and your own book ratings. It could even mean having a "frequent-buyer book club."

In short, your goal should be to make your store--your business—so distinctive that absolutely no big chain or run-of-the-mill independent book store could hold a candle to you.

Dare to be Different

Now, let's talk about wholesalers. In the wholesale business, more than almost any other field, the marketplace works very hard to turn you into a price-based commodity. But, even though that's the case, you don't have to give in. There's no reason in the world why you have to be content selling the same commodity items the same way that all your competitors do. You can package. You can bundle. You can combine different products together.

If the world is selling widgets for $2.00 a piece, but in order to use widgets the customer has to have other items or services prior to and after the purchase, you can combine those products and services and make your offer very unique and very appealing!

If everyone is selling computers for $2,000, but in order to use a certain computer you have to have certain kinds of software, cables and printer toner cartridges--and whatever--why sell the computer for $2,000 and make 5% (or $100), if you could sell your computer for $2,100 or for $2,400 and throw in toner cartridges, paper and software with a retail value of $1,000 and actually make a far bigger profit?

Always position your company and your products and your people "above." Be more dimensional. Be more expansive than your competitors. If your salespeople have strong product knowledge, and people come to buy from you, your sales staff shouldn't just sell them a commodity, they should give the customers an education! If you sell computers, give your customers a year's worth of absolutely unlimited, free follow-up support. Give them a great discount on the paper and the toner, too. If they buy from you, they get to buy toner for two years at cost, or software for two years at 40 percent off. That will make you a very unique and valuable customer resource.

You can run with that distinction and leave your competitors far behind.

Professionals Profit, Too

If everyone is selling medical services, accounting services, financial planning services, how do you, as a professional, differentiate?

There are a number of ways to do it. First, you can offer the first client consultation absolutely free. But don't call it "free." I would say, "We will buy you $4,200 (or $500 or $1,000) worth of our services before we accept you as a client, because we know from experience that it is critically important that we both evaluate the contribution we can make to each other. If we can't tangibly and dramatically contribute in a beneficial way to your business or personal situation, we don't deserve to have you as a client. We don't deserve to be paid or keep a dollar of your money."

Then I would say, "Rather than have you pay us and find out after we've started that we can't help you, we would rather pay for our services for the first two or three sessions so that you will still come out advantaged in the relationship because you will have learned something of at least some value at no cost to you."

Before you even ask a client to become a client, offer them free educational training programs, seminars, symposiums or special briefings. Do it "live." Or do it by producing reports or video tapes or audio tapes and sending them out. Or conduct telephone conference calls with groups of like-minded people. You have all sorts of creative
options.

All of these free informational processes can give you a massive competitive advantage. If everyone else is saying, "Pay me, and I'll give you ideas and information," and you instead are saying, "I will pay to give you ideas or information free of charge as a sample of my skill (or my mind or my ability or my expertise or my service) before I ask you to pay," you are immediately in a class by yourself.

Throughout the process, resolve to do things differently. When you bill a client or patient by the hour, or by the project or by the visit, throw in complimentary products or services.

Here's an example: I have a CPA who charges me a lot but continuously sends me invoices in which he enumerates certain charges that he writes off or absorbs as a professional courtesy. Some fees he cuts in half, so that every month, if my normal bill is $5,000, there might be $1,000 he writes off or there might be $1,000 he cuts in half. I always feel that he is giving me a great advantage. I appreciate him.

If you do things like that, you're going to distinguish yourself at a high level. Do it better. Care more. Give more. Dimensionalize more. Realize that the customer or the client you deal with is a whole entity. They have a family. They have a job. They have health issues. They have dreams and they have goals.

Let me give you an illustration of this dynamic principle at work: I had a thoracic surgeon as a client. Together we developed a referral-generating program for general practitioners. Besides telling them about his own expertise, I had the surgeon create booklets that he disseminated to general practitioners that explained things they should know when deciding whether or not to send a patient to a thoracic surgeon.

I also had him create other informative materials for physicians that had nothing to do with thoracic surgery, or even medicine! We created a booklet called "Managing Stress in Your Practice," and one titled "How to Get More Loyalty and Performance Out of Your Staff." We then created a booklet titled, "How to Market Your Professional Services Ethically, Inexpensively, Successfully." Why? Because we knew that general practitioners were individuals in business who felt stress, who had problems with their staff and who were concerned about their wealth and eventual retirement. We dealt with those concerns on a holistic basis, and the response sent my client's patient referrals and sales through the roof.

You don't have to play the game of retailing, or the game of wholesaling, or any business-building game by a tired set of rules. You can play innovatively and by your own rules--and that's how I want you to play. The things I'm suggesting will help you gain more customers, bigger units of sales and more frequent purchases by each and every person you serve.

You can break the mold. You can add more items for the same price. You can package things together. You can offer customers more free information and advice. You can make alliances with all kinds of other companies. You can even profitably utilize independent experts whose ability will lend tremendously to your customer or client getting a greater result of benefit out of the product or service you sell.

Let me sketch this out:

Let's say you sell products that are produced to specifications. You might put a top-grade design engineer on your consulting payroll and have him or her freely consult in advance with prospective customers or clients before you even ask them for a sale.

My point: You are not forced to do what anyone else does. The object is to distinguish yourself by giving more information, by giving more value, by giving more benefit--by giving things before, during or after the sale that no one else would give, and by caring dimensionally at a much broader level than anyone else.

Take the product or the service you most often sell and test different presentations in which you add other products or services to it at a very advantageous overall price.

Try it small scale, if you're uneasy, but please do this just as soon as you can. I predict that the test will work and that it will revolutionize your whole way of thinking about growing your business.

Then, try talking to your customers about other issues in their business or life above and beyond the one area they are dealing with you in a typical transaction. If they typically buy because of a manufacturing need, talk to them about management, about taxation, about selling methods, about inventory control--about other issues that you know are of keen interest to them but you've never seen fit to discuss. Take note of what they say and offer helpful advice if the opportunity arises. I can't assure you of an immediate, positive result, but I can guarantee you that you will build goodwill that translates into future business.

Continue experimenting until you find the best premises, and then combine those successful elements together in your company's marketing strategy.

Also, continue to test new combinations, because just because you find one that is superior to what you're doing now doesn't mean you can't improve upon it many times over.

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This resource is (c) Jay Abraham, a renowned marketing expert, and is taken from the "Jay Abraham's Business Breakthroughs" newsletter.