Do you realize how boring your industry has become? Probably not. You deal with it every day. You dream up seemingly innovative ways to sell your products or services. Your differences with competitors are clear to you.

Problem is, your customers likely don’t see it. You and your competitors are virtually identical. There’s only the slightest of superficial differentiation. Rarely enough to justify switching. That’s why they stay with you or with them. It’s why you’re not closing even more deals.

My suggestion: push the envelope. If you can influence the fulfillment of your product (how it’s packaged, delivered, or serviced), do so radically. If you can’t influence it, change the playing field in buyers’ eyes. Change the way your products are perceived by customers by changing how they evaluate their current service and how they approach the problems they think they’re solving with your products and services.

Focus all of your communcation, from beginning to end during the sales process, on changing how your industry is seen. Re-position everything so that you are carrying the flag for the industry into the new wave of doing things.

Now, not every buyer wants to work with a revolutionary. Not everyone will want to try something new. But the newness piques curiosity initially. It gets the ball rolling. Momentum has to start somewhere.

I’ve suggested previously that you should carry a “You want this” attitude about how you sell. Go shake things up. Speak confidently about your new, innovative, cutting-edge look at the future of your business and industry, and people will begin to follow.

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