For what seems like several lifetimes, marketeers have been preaching the importance of being different.

In Positioning being different meant differentiating yourself in the mind of your prospect.

In Marketing Warfare being different meant using a differentiating idea to defend, attack, flank, or become a guerrilla.

In The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing being different meant using a differentiating idea to build a brand.

In The Power of Simplicity being different meant using a strategy that was all about differentiation.

Being different is now at the heart of all marketing strategy?

You might assume that by now the message has been delivered. Everyone is busy building "differentiation" into their plans. And no one would leave home without his or her differentiating idea. Right?

Wrong.

What we tend to see are two types of organisations. One type still doesn’t get it. They’re out there doing battle with "higher quality" or "good value" or good old "better products". They feel that they are better than their competitors and that truth will out. They surround themselves with gurus who talk about quality, empowerment, customer orientation and various forms of leadership. Unfortunately, all of their competitors are surrounded by the same cast of "you can get better" gurus. Nothing different.

The other type of organisation understands the need to be different. But after some prodding, they will admit that they just don’t know how to do it. Their excuse; our product or sales force just isn’t that much different from our competitors’. They tend to get sucked in by the motivation crowd that promises peak performance, a winning attitude, and effective habits. Unfortunately, the same cast of characters is hanging around and motivating their competitors. Nothing different.

And they don’t get much help from the big-name academics. Harvard’s Michael Porter, for example, does talk about the need for a unique position, but he never offers much help on how to be unique. Instead, he talks about strategic continuity, deepening strategic position and minimising trade-offs. And he talks to any competitor who will pay for his fee. Nothing different.

And advertising agencies aren’t much better. They talk about bonding, likeability, breakthroughs, and cool. To them it’s all about being artful, not scientific. Nothing different.

The "Differentiate or Die" concept is about changing all that. It outlines the many ways in which you can be different while avoiding the lure of those things that sound different but really aren’t. It explains how you can identify your own unique weapons and use core ideas to carry them through the company.

Differentiation today is different from branding – it is the essence of what branding is about.