In nearly every brand workshop I lead, there comes a moment when leaders are asked: Why do customers choose you? The answers are familiar. We provide next-level service. Our people are our differentiator. We do the right thing, even when it’s hard.

These aren’t wrong and they matter, to be sure. But they’re not differentiators. They’re table stakes—statements every competitor could claim with a straight face.

Moving Past Comfortable Stories

Organizations naturally create stories to explain their success. Over time, those stories calcify into clichés that feel profound internally but sound generic externally. To uncover what truly sets you apart, you have to push past the first layer.

A simple framework helps. Take any of those familiar claims and ask five questions:

1. What does this look like in practice?

2. How do we do it differently from everyone else?

3. What measurable impact does it create for customers?

4. How does it connect to the customer’s bottom line?

5. Can we prove it with examples?

An Example in Practice

Consider the claim: “We make our customers feel seen and heard.” Push it through the five questions:

• Practice: Senior architects spend two weeks on-site observing how people use space before design begins.

• Difference: Unlike most firms, they employ certified behavioral architects.

• Impact: This reduces revisions by 65% and improves space utilization by 30%.

• Bottom line: Clients save an average of $175,000 per project in change orders.

• Proof: In one headquarters project, collaboration rose 64% while the company fit 20% more employees into 25% less space.

Suddenly, the cliché becomes a differentiator: “We design buildings around human behavior, not just aesthetics—delivering 30% more efficient spaces that people love to use.”

Making It Real

This process works with any cliché. If you start with “our people are our differentiator,” the questions will force you to specify: how your people operate differently, what unique processes they use, the measurable results they achieve, and how those results impact customers.

The final test is simple: Would competitors need to fundamentally change their business to make this same claim? Can you back it up with proof? Will customers recognize it as true about you?

If the answer is yes, you’ve found a genuine differentiator—specific, credible, and compelling.

True differentiation isn’t about sounding different. It’s about proving value in a way no one else can.