This work offers a summary of the book “DIFFERENTIATE OR DIE: Survival in Our Era of Killer Competition by Jack Trout and Steve Rivkin”

To succeed, you have to stand out from the crowd. You need to offer something nobody else can match. In other words, you need to differentiate yourself.
The process of differentiation takes place in the mind of your prospect, where a game of mental association runs. When the prospect hears a brand name, they automatically think of whatever attribute they have come to associate with that brand. The most successful brands in history are differentiated by being linked to very basic, very essential attributes -- like ‘‘safety’’, ‘‘refreshment’’ or ‘‘performance’’. The process of differentiation is the technique by which those mental associations are formed and then reinforced in the mind of the prospect.
Any company’s ultimate and sustainable competitive advantage is its ability to differentiate itself from all its competitors. Unless a company achieves this and sustains the effort, it’s unlikely to survive, much less excel.