Tip 119 – Specific = believable for discriminators - Shipley Asia Pacific

You cannot assert a discriminator unless you understand your customer, your competitors and yourselves.

A common problem is lack of accurate competitor data when you claim that an aspect of your solution is a discriminator. When you do not know specifically what your competitor offers, discriminate your features against other criteria, like national averages, independent study results or other approaches that you considered but rejected.

Develop discriminators by continuing to define them more specifically. Progress from generic to specific as in the following example:
*Experienced manager.
*Experienced project manager.
*All project managers have a minimum of 10 years of experience.
*Fred Jones, our proposed project manager, has 10 years of project management experience.
*Fred Jones, our proposed project manager, also managed the similar North Cove project to an on-time delivery and within budget.

Be as specific as possible. The claim of a 14.5 percent improvement is more credible than a 15 percent claim, appearing to be more precise.