UnCommoditizing Your Services by Delivering What Clients Truly Value

For this series, Twennie has drawn from a landmark 2018 Harvard Business Review article titled The B2B Elements of Value by Eric Almquist, Jamie Cleghorn, and Lori Sherer. Building on that framework, we guide Twennie’s learners—especially those in technical and design services—through the process of planning a brand differentiation program using a custom-built “value pyramid.” This pyramid helps you define and deliver value that makes your firm stand out for more than just price. (We recommend reviewing the Twennie article and/or the original HBR article before starting the exercise.)

This prompt set is part of the Un-Commoditizing Your Services series on Twennie. This series aims to help a services team enhance their services brand by delivering unique types of value beyond the minimum expected. Those types make the client experience different from what they get from competitors, thus making those clients more inclined to hire you based on something other than price. If you have conducted the Un-Commoditizing your Services exercise and have an un-commoditizing plan in play, completing this prompt set will support your team's efforts.

This prompt set is designed to help consultants and project teams operationalize the principles of un-commoditizing their services by integrating client-centered value into the fabric of everyday work. While proposals often articulate bold commitments to values like transparency, responsiveness, innovation, and reduced client burden, this prompt set reinforces the small, habitual actions that make those commitments real — and felt — by clients. After completing this set, your team will be accustomed to delivering on important KPIs in project management.

This exercise helps teams break out of price-based competition by identifying what clients truly value and building those elements into their service delivery. Using a structured pyramid approach, teams define baseline expectations, elevate performance standards, and select strategic “extra mile” actions that differentiate their brand. Participants prioritize value-driven behaviours and apply them consistently across projects or selectively for high-impact opportunities.

The Un-Commoditizing Plan Template guides teams in defining and delivering what clients truly value by structuring strategy across different client tiers. It helps organizations identify functional, ease-of-use, individual, and inspirational value, then align these with measurable KPIs and project delivery practices. By segmenting clients and tailoring value delivery accordingly, teams move beyond commodity services toward differentiated, relationship-driven offerings.