Best-selling author, Hall of Fame speaker, and distinction expert Scott McKain explains different vs. distinctive, pursuit vs. attraction, the 4 cornerstones of setting yourself apart, and how creating clarity often means saying “no”.

Scott McKain is the country's leading expert on

creating business and professional distinction. So

what Scott really does as he help create more compelling

connections between you and your customers, helps you stand out

and move up in every phase of business, best selling author.

And he has a great book called Create distinction, what to do

when great isn't good enough to grow your business. So he's here

to talk to us today about creating distinction. Scott

McKain, thank you for being here, brother.

Thank you so much for having me with you this

morning. I really appreciate it, man. Thank you.

Talk to us, like, why did you kind of build this career

around that word? And why do you think that distinction is so

important in in business today?

Great question. Yeah, you only heard so much

about differentiation, you know, we, we need to establish

differentiation between us than our competition, or what do we

do to differentiate ourselves from other people on the job so

that we get the promotion. And it occurred to me, you know, If

I slap every customer in the face, I'm different. That

doesn't mean to grow my business, right. So there had to

be something else. And as I looked at other industries, you

know, for example, you walk into a Best Buy store to buy a laptop

computer. Sony is differentiated, Samsung Dell are

differentiated from from the great math is like a third a

Seuss and gateway and Fujitsu. But Apple is truly distinctive.

And so what does it take not just to be different from your

competitor, but to be so distinctive, that you attract

people to do business with you. And that that's true, whether

you're an individual salesperson out there, or you know, making

calls and knocking on doors, or whether you're the CEO of a

small, mid or large size business, we all have to find

ways to answer this critical question. And that is, how can

my customers tell the difference between the competition?

So what's the real difference between being

distinct and not just different?

Well, there's a couple of ways in the in in the

book, I talk about the four cornerstones of distinction as

we examine distinctive organizations to the stinky

professionals. It was interesting that not only did

they have these four qualities, but they tended to do the floor

in a specific order, and in a similar order to one another.

But to answer that specific question about how can you tell,

I think it's the difference, the difference between pursuit and

attraction, a differentiated company or a company that's

trapped in that sea of sameness. Man, they have to be out there

hustling and knocking on doors and just tracking down at

hunting customers. He distinctive organization has a

plan of acquisition. So they're out there, you know, trying to

get new customers, but they are so compelling. Customers are

attracted to do business with them. You know, Apple does a lot

in the business world, there's a lot of businesses that have

Apple computers in the business, that Apple practically had the

zero size Salesforce for the business arena. And the reason

is, because those of us that like Apple go to work and got a

you know, gosh, we, instead of using the Blackberry, we wanted

to use our iPhones at work. Instead of using a typical

Windows machine, we want to use our Macbook Pro at work. Now,

Apple is an overused example. But we can find it whether it's

Enterprise rental car, because they bring the car to us. In the

Pacific Northwest Les Schwab tires, because they run out to

service. There are many, many examples of even small

businesses that do something incredibly distinctive to make a

difference. And it turns customers into advocates, we're

out there, I'm on the phone telling you that you've got to

do business at this place. Because they provide such a

compelling experience. If we put as much effort into making our

businesses distinctive, as we do and to track it down. And see,

this is where the price question comes into play as well. People

say, Well, you know, they're, they're loyal to me, because

I've got the cheapest price. Well, they're not loyal to you,

they're loyal to the price. The critically important aspect of

getting out of that cyclical nature of we've got to have the

cheapest try to get business. And then we erode our margins.

And then we're not a profitable organization, or a salesperson

on the road, blames the home office because they won't cut

the price instead of becoming a better salesperson. All of these

are challenges that we see every single day in businesses

everywhere.

Now one of the things you mentioned earlier, the four

cornerstones of distinction. You know, the first one is clarity.

And I love this because you say in the book, that clarity means

being just as exact about who you are not, as it does with who

you really are. And yet there's this temptation to always say,

Well, yeah, I do that too. How do you in terms of creating

clarity? How do you most effectively determine who you

are not? Or what things you should say no to?

It comes out of where are you willing to plant

your flag in the ground? That is what you stand for? What are my

new favorite television shows on the Food Network? It's called

restaurant impossible. The new Chef Robert Irvine news in save,

you know, the failing restaurant, and it occurred to

me that without fail, one of the things he does is take items off

the menu, because so many of these restaurants keep adding

items to think well if we Through Chinese dishes, then,

you know, we'll get some more customers there. And if we have

Italian dishes, we'll get some work through there. And if we do

that at the end of the day, then they appeal to no one, because

they don't have customers want clarity about what you are. And

so I would begin by taking a look at where are you going to

plant your flag in the ground, it doesn't mean that you can't

do other things. For example, you know, Papa John says better

ingredients, better pizza, but they still deliberate most

locations. But when you think of fast and quick delivery, you

tend to think of Domino's. So Domino's planted their flag in

the ground at delivery. And that's where the point of

emphasis is going to be. Papa John's has planted their flag of

the ground of having better ingredients that are better

pizza, so their flag is in the ground about a better case.

Well, even though these two businesses compete with each

other, we as customers have a pretty clear idea of when we

want a higher quality pizza, who we're going to call, or if we're

hungry, and we need it in 30 minutes, who we're going to call

and so that that's the key is letting your customers know

where your flag is in the ground and what you stand for. And then

it just in terms of prioritization, gosh, we just

don't have time to get it all done. Well, that's the problem.

You're trying to get it all done. I want to flag in the

ground and say, This is who we are. And this is what we're

clear about. And then spend your time emphasizing your clarity, I

get it, look, let's face it, customers, and employees too,

will never become loyal to a generic. I've never seen that

the grocery store or these white cans of beer on them. And I

don't know that anybody was loyal to beer that certain

people would pick up a Bud Light, or certain people pick up

a six pack of Coors or that oh, that kind of thing with all

buddies loyal, who is generic, you're loyal to something that's

specific, you're loyal to something, whether it's a person

that has your loyalty, or whether it's an organization by

how they treat you or what they do distinctively, that creates

loyalty. But you can't differentiate what you can't

define. I can't tell you how I'm better or, or different from my

competitor, unless I first defined it. But yet many of us

just keep doing our job. And we assume the customer is gonna

know. If product is one thing. What else do you sell? Well,

let's make a list of those things that you sell. And every

organization will say, Oh, we have great customer service. And

we have great relationships with our customers, we peace of mind,

and all of these things. Well, there's two critical points

about that. First of all, the things that they say they sell,

are absolutely identical to what the competitor.

Scott, it's been such a great time with you. And we you

know, one last little question, I just wanted to make sure that

we we gave you a chance to speak on as I love how in this book,

you talk about creating distinction, not not only as a

successful like business principle, but also that it

applies to a person on an individual level.

Real quickly, it's the four cornerstones is being

clear about what you are one of the things we you know, Zig

Ziglar used to talk about the people that are wandering

generalities, you know, that they never really focused on

anything or achieve anything. So it's being very clear about what

you want them, it's being creative in your approach,

finding a way to go at it in a unique and creative manner.

There's a three step plan in the book about how you how you

actually execute on creativity. The third is communication. And

what we find that in today's world of people want a

narrative. It's not that they don't want facts and figures and

information they do. But they want it placed within a

compelling narrative. So it's learning how to communicate,

it's learning how to tell a story. And then the fourth and

final one is a customer experience focus. So whether

we're talking about the external customers that an organization

serves, or the internal customers that you and I serve,

as we work inside our organization, we not only have

to look at how we deliver the the aspect of our job, but also

how it makes people feel, how are we connecting with them? How

are we growing relationships, our weak stimulating people that

are our advocates and our supporters? So if you follow

those four, as a professional, you're going to stand down as an

organization you're gonna stand out. And and I think that's part

of what we're looking for in today's world is what can I do

so that I can achieve my potential? What can I do so I

can get recognized for my effort. And if we do those

things, I think we're well on the pathway to creating

distinction.

I love it. I love it folks. Clarity, creativity,

communication, customer experience, focus. Those are the

four cornerstones. Scott, thanks for being with us, brother.

Thank you. You bet.