Distinguishing Yourself in the Market: Embracing What Sets You Apart from Others

August 28th, 2024 (Updated in May 2025)

In today's bustling marketplace, a brand's visual identity is more than just a pretty face. It should be unmistakably unique, expressing who the brand is and signaling what it believes. A clear, distinct identity is the key to being remembered, comfortable in its difference, and sharp enough to cut through the noise.

Take Mailchimp, for instance. This email software, with its humorous tone and playful design, intentionally sounds like a cartoon character. It's relentlessly small-business friendly, making it a standout choice in a sea of competitors.

Similarly, Salesforce has injected warmth, storytelling, and a community-first brand strategy into the B2B SaaS category. By making enterprise feel human, Salesforce has set itself apart and redefined the industry.

Differentiation is essential for strong brand-building, especially in oversaturated markets. It helps customers remember a brand, justifies a premium, speeds up decision-making, and builds loyalty beyond price.

The tone of voice of a brand should not be generic but should push further to be brutally honest, cheerfully rebellious, calm but uncompromising, or any other unique personality that resonates with the brand's audience.

Glossier, a minimalist beauty brand built by its users, exemplifies this. With a clean aesthetic and customer-led storytelling, Glossier became the anti-brand and wildly successful.

A24, an indie film studio turned cultural tastemaker, embraces a dark, artsy, emotionally charged mood and uses minimalist branding and word-of-mouth marketing to reinforce its mystique.

Brands that are more mentally available (easily noticed and remembered) grow faster and command more market share. If a brand can be swapped with a competitor's and no one would notice, it has a problem. The solution is to be honest, sharp, and unmistakably unique.

The brand story is a powerful shortcut to trust and should be used to build emotional connection and reinforce the 'why' of the brand. Bold, consistent creative decisions are often memorable and should be made in ad copy, UX microcopy, campaign art direction, and more.

Gymshark, a fitness brand built on community, not just kit, has a distinct brand tone, design system, and loyal ambassador network. Its difference is its moat, but only if it is bold enough to commit to it and let that difference inform everything from messaging to product roadmap.

These brands are examples because they fully embrace and communicate their unique value propositions, creating strong identities and loyal customer bases by consistently differentiating themselves in design, marketing, and product experience. Differentiation lies deeper than product features and can be found by asking questions such as what beliefs the brand has that others don't, the brand's origin story, the audience the brand exists for, the attitude towards the problem being solved, and how the brand behaves differently.

In a world where sameness is the norm, being different is the key to success. Embrace your uniqueness, and let it shine.

Distinguishing Yourself in the Market: Embracing What Sets You Apart from Others