POV
Fintechs don’t lose to louder competitors because they lack differentiation. They lose because buyers can’t place them in context. In banking, category clarity is a risk control:
Budgets map to categories.
Procurement and third‑party risk use category codes.
RFPs are written in category language.
BrandThnk: Lead with the bank’s box (category). Then earn the right to show your sharp edge (difference).
Field Note
A COO at an AI‑driven credit decisioning fintech put it bluntly:
“We used words like ‘workflow’ and ‘automation’ because that’s what the market understood. But we’re not a workflow tool. Every competitor used the same words, so buyers lumped us together—even though our tech was fundamentally different.”
The fix wasn’t abandoning familiar language. It was entering the conversation where the banker already was and using the bank’s category labels, then pivoting to bank outcomes (e.g., time‑to‑decision SLAs, loss rate, CECL readiness, fair‑lending explainability).
Once prospects could file them under an obvious label, doors opened. Inside the room, differentiation became a strength, not a source of confusion.
Try This With Your Team
Pick your most bank‑friendly category.
Examples: fraud detection, core integration, digital onboarding, treasury management, credit decisioning, KYC/KYB, collections, data enrichment.Name one sharp edge (pick one): speed, integration surface area, risk reduction, unit economics, compliance coverage, explainability.
Do the 2‑sentence test (box → difference):
Sentence 1 — Box: “We’re a [bank category] for [segment/use case].”
Sentence 2 — Edge: “Unlike [status quo / label buyers know], we [unique mechanism] that delivers [bank metric that matters] in [timeframe], [proof].”
Examples (replace placeholders with your specifics):
Fraud: “We’re a fraud detection platform for card and ACH. Unlike rules‑only tools, we auto‑tune models per segment on your data to cut false positives and protect basis points of interchange, [customer proof].”
Digital onboarding (SMB): “We do digital onboarding for SMB. Unlike KYB that stops at documents, we pre‑verify via a business‑graph so ~70% are instantly approved, lowering drop‑off, [case study].”
Core integration: “We provide core integration to Fiserv/FIS. Unlike custom SIs, we ship pre‑built adaptors for go‑live in 45 days with bank‑grade TPRM packs, [reference].”
Translate to procurement/RFP language (so you get routed correctly):
Description field: “Category: [chosen category]. Capabilities: [3–5 keywords bankers already use].”
Keywords to mirror: Pull exact terms from recent RFPs and third‑party risk portals. Avoid inventing a new label.
Tip: If you can’t make the box → difference turn cleanly, you’re either boxing yourself wrong or differentiating too abstractly.
The Takeaway
Banks don’t buy new. They buy better without more risk.
First, show them the box you belong in.
Then prove the edge that makes that box better.
This BrandThnk Briefing is invite‑only, but feel free to share it with a fintech or FI leader who’s wrestling with clarity vs. differentiation.
—Allison