12 Competitive Differentiation Examples That Differentiate a Purpose-Driven Business
How do you differentiate your purpose-driven business? 12 leaders give you some specific and practical strategies.
What makes your purpose-driven small business different from competitors?
To help small businesses set themselves apart, we asked entrepreneurs and business leaders this question for their best insights. From serving your target market to integrating your values into service, there are several examples that differentiate a business and can help you find greater success.
Here are 12 strategies for competitive differentiation:
● Prioritize Equity and Inclusion
● Highlight Your Commitment
● Enable Flexible Work Processes
● Offer Great Value
● Create Unique Experiences
● Provide Holistic Support
● Use Lived Experience as Foundation
● Focus on Customer Service
● Cater to Health Focused Clientele
● Be Clear and Transparent
● Integrate Your Values Into Service
● Disrupt Your Industry
Prioritize Equity and Inclusion
I lead with equity and inclusion and impacts on the community. Every company, regardless of sector, from hundreds of employees to solopreneurs can put equity as a top working, living priority. I consult on all social enterprise points for measuring and improving impacts. So often equity as a priority is missed as an action item. Businesses can be stronger with this learning. It's a journey for always, my next step is to earn a certification in this from the Institute for Equity Centered Coaching. I really help companies see where they can make impacts they hadn't thought of!
-Kim Allchurch Flick, Mighty Epiphyte
Highlight Your Commitment
Giving back is a key element of my business. I also focus on and adapt to the individual needs of each client. The commitment to improving every day for the past 22+ years in this profession has become evident in my level of customer service. I am a fourth-generation Supervising Principal Real Estate Broker with a powerful network of professionals who share my devotion to mastery. As my client, you have the benefit of becoming part of this network for life!
-Charles Ramsay, Metro PDX Homes
Enable Flexible Work Processes
We're a tight-knit, dynamic, and collaborative team. We have the flexibility to go all in on projects or delegate our work out for each team member to take charge on a different project. And we take client relationships seriously. We never advocate for anyone to invest in video unless their business is ready for it. Finally, once we finish a project, we stay in touch, often offering recommendations for how clients can best use their videos to reach the most people. That's why we're the highest rated video production company in Oregon on Google.
-Erik Croswell, Bridge City Media
Offer Great Value
At Eurodenture, our highly experienced staff create comfortable dentures using the latest dental technology and materials at an affordable price. We have multiple locations in Idaho, Oregon and Washington state where we offer many services such as denture implants, full or partial dentures, denture repair and more. We also have a dedicated staff of friendly customer care professionals ready to assist and answer any questions or concerns that our patients might have.
-Henry Babichenko, Eurodenture
Create Unique Experiences
Our mission is to educate as many people as possible about highly-technical topics such as cyber security through effective and memorable gamified techniques. This unique method of teaching is what makes our business stand out from the competition. Our process is memorable and fun and allows people to really engage in these learnings.
-Nick Santora, Curricula
Provide Holistic Support
When it comes to our competitors, they heavily push on just licensing. With our business, we want to provide education on the whole package. Learning how to do lashes is just the beginning of anyone's career. Learning how to grow your own business and how to best market yourself and your talent is not something that comes easy. With us, we not only want you to be empowered to learn a new skill and talent, we also want you to succeed. Having someone in your corner for growing your business is what sets us apart.
-Vanessa Molica, The Lash Professional
Use Lived Experience as Foundation
The thing that makes us different from competitors is that our foundation is built from the lived experience of being an entrepreneur. We focus strongly on aiding small businesses because we are intimately familiar with the hardship of financing small businesses. This intimate knowledge fueled our Rate Reduction program. We want to help small businesses succeed without falling trap to the status-quo, which for some people isn’t effective. Being able to reduce the interest rates with our program helps us put money back into the pockets of the entrepreneurs for their continued success, and that’s what it’s really all about. Making sure that small business owners can succeed with the loans that they receive from us to grow their business.
-Sundip Patel, LendThrive
Focus on Customer Service
We have been in the insurance industry for 15 years and know that it's a competitive market. A key competitive advantage is the customer service we provide from agents who have won awards for their knowledge and skill in the field. We prioritize service in a way that makes our customers stay with us for years. Part of that customer support is our ability to offer same day auto insurance — often within minutes, 24/7 access to online tools and resources, and dedicated account managers.
-Brandon K. Berglund, Berglund Insurance
Cater to Health Focused Clientele
Our dog food is formulated based on the tested and proven principles of Eastern Food Therapy that supports a healthy immune system and heals a variety of health concerns with specialized formulations to bring balance and healing to each pet. Our products contain a nourishing profile of real, whole foods with no synthetics, additives, and fillers. Our recipes are gently blended and freeze dried raw to preserve nutritional properties of the whole food ingredients. We believe in taking it back to basics so your pup can absorb the full benefits of our nutrition-rich recipes in their natural format.
-Carol Bramson, Side By Side
Be Clear and Transparent
One way to differentiate your company from your competitors is to find the perfect balance between supporting your current customers and attracting your future customers. I say this is a balance because your current customers may be very different from your new customers and may have different needs – yet you’ll want to satisfy both. This is important because you need to continue growing as a business in order to survive, and as you grow, your approach, pricing, or deliverables may change. This may attract new customers but disappoint current customers. So, do your research, be transparent with your clients, ask for their thoughts and input, and be decisive about your direction. Striking the perfect balance in this scenario will help you solidify sustainable growth in the market.
-Mike Krau, Markitors
Integrate Your Values Into Service
For us, our values are out in the open 一 nobody has to guess what we value. Fabric was designed with families in mind. Our company's sole purpose is to make life insurance and family finances easy. We all want to ensure that our kids are taken care of and our company makes it easy to do just that. By integrating our values with our services, we've been able to identify and attract customers who value the same things as us.
-Brooke Wilson, Fabric
Disrupt Your Industry
What makes your business different from competitors is that our plant-based, protein-packed pork rinds are disrupting the snack industry. Whether people love "traditional" pork rinds or have never had them, we're confident that they're going to love our Pig Out Pigless Pork Rinds. People want to eat mindfully but without sacrificing taste or texture. That's why Chef Dave carefully crafts our foods to give it the flavor and crunch you crave, but with tons of nutrition and no animal ingredients! I'm also personally motivated to make an impact on people’s health, the environment, and animal welfare.
-Bill Glaser, Outstanding Foods
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