SEO. Backlinks. Social media. Content. Keywords. They’re all necessary for online marketing success. Yet, one strategy is superior to these—and most small businesses don’t even know what it is.

Those things listed above? They’re tactics. Anyone can do them. Everyone does them. They make a difference. But imagine stumbling upon a real game-changer: one special thing that completely blows your competition out of the water. And when you find it, you have no problem attracting more business. In fact, you need to learn how to manage it all.

Is this some sort of gimmicky marketing tactic? Absolutely not. It’s 100% legit.

So, what is it?

Why Differentiation Makes All the Difference (Pun Intended)

It’s rare to find one business that offers a specific product or service. Today, you always have more options than you can count on one hand, and sometimes, more than you can count on your hands and feet.

What makes customers choose your company over another? Personal service? Well, yes. But other companies offer that too. Lower prices? Again, yes, but it’s tough to provide a high-quality product or service at low prices unless you’re a massive corporation—and even then, it’s difficult.

Let Me Share an Amazing (And 100% True) Story to Show You How This Works

“Our beer is 100% pure!” yelled and screamed nearly every American beer company in the 1900s. The company that won the advertising war could usually front the most dollars to maintain their market position—which was one way to win. But what if you’re a small business lacking massive spending power?

Schlitz, at the time, ranked somewhere between 8^th and 15^th in beer sales in America. While consumers back then had no clue what “pure” meant, they only bought from the company whose name was most easily recognizable—which poor Schlitz was not. So, they hired advertising legend Claude Hopkins. They were desperate.

Wanting to know what “pure” really meant, Hopkins asked Schlitz if he could tour their facilities and thus saw 4,000-foot-deep wells dug to provide the purest and cleanest water available. Schlitz also showed him the 1,200 experiments it had taken to produce their signature beer flavor. Blown away, Hopkins asked, “Why don’t you tell consumers you do this?” “Because every beer company does the same thing,” Schlitz replied matter-of-factly.

Hopkins ultimately convinced Schlitz to let him discuss their processes and how they yielded “pure” beer, arguing this approach would work because no other company marketed in this manner. Consumers would finally understand what “pure” meant and just how pure their beer really was. This resulted in ads like this:

Within six months, Schlitz became the top-selling American beer. Consumers understood what pure meant and why they should care—believing Schlitz was different than all the others!

How Can You Truly Differentiate?

Yes, marketing and advertising really work and should produce measurable sales results. Differentiation is the easiest way to get those results, so how can you be truly different in your niche? Why should customers do business with you and no one else? Find a persuasive answer to that question, and you’ll bring in all the business you could ever want.