Quality: Part 1

I have a challenge for every Brand Manager and Marketing Manager out there:
When you describe your brand, write a positioning statement, and try to define your competitive differentiators don't use the word "quality".

It's entirely too common to take a very black-and-white approach to branding and decide that a company or its products are focused on either:
a.) Quality
or
b.) Bargain

Since there's only room for one or two "Lowest price. Guaranteed" competitors in any market, that means that the majority of companies are going for the quality angle.

It's lazy and, even worse, almost meaningless. What does "quality" mean, anyway? It seems like a very arbitrary term like "value" and "unique". As a result, most consumers probably ignore the word any time a company claims it.

I'm not saying that quality isn't an important attribute. It definitely is. There's too much garbage out there and I'd love to see more companies strive for a higher level of quality. But, it's too vague.

Pick some different words. Something more detailed. Even just one step more specific would be great. How about "innovative", or "remarkable" (a great term that Seth Godin uses regularly), or "shocking", or "guaranteed", or "unbreakable" for starters?

There are some industries where every single competitor claims to provide "quality". It might be true, but they all take a different approach and have a different definition. I want to see what those differences are.

Remove the word from your vocabulary and I bet you'll get more creative and descriptive.