Branding Information

Successful Guru marketers have a secret weapon that they use every single time they communicate about their businesses. It's one of those intangibles that are easily misunderstood. It's the ability to generate excitement about what you have to offer. And when your prospects are excited about your services, marketing becomes a whole lot easier. You get more attention, more response, more sales and more referrals.

Excitement is often misunderstood because we usually equate excitement purely with displays of high energy and enthusiasm. The stereotypical marketer is PT Barnum and Anthony Robbins rolled into one with enough energy to light a small city. This ideal is not so easy to emulate. Most of us give up on the idea of generating excitement because we don't think we have the personality for it. We feel it would be artificial and forced.

Does an infectious enthusiasm about what you offer make a difference? Of course it does, but we believe it's only a small part of the equation. It's way overrated. Enthusiasm can be shallow. It can me manufactured. It offers no real proof that what you offer delivers true value. Prospects don't become interested and excited about your services just because you show enthusiasm. They become excited when they understand that your services will make a real difference in their lives and their businesses.

What I find so frequently with Independent Professionals is that they have failed to discover and articulate the *inherent excitement* in the services they are offering. When they discover that excitement and learn how to express it, their marketing goes to a whole new level.

While we were writing this we got a call from a client, a financial planner, who we had helped with the copy on his web site. His previous site failed to generate excitement and he wasn't getting any new business from it. With the new copy, prospects got excited and started to call him. He now generates most of his new business from this web site.

The good news is that generating excitement is a whole lot easier than it may sound.

Let me paint you a little scenario.

We have two sales consultants, A and B. They both do pretty much the same thing (they even offer the same program). They are equally intelligent and capable of producing valuable results for their clients. However their messages are very different:

Consultant A uses the following marketing message:

We offer sales training for people newly entering your sales team. We use the Fast Start Sales Training System, which is specifically designed for new salespeople. We offer training programs from one day to one week in duration and we cover all the most important sales skills. We are able to customize the training programs for your industry and company. We have experience in 107 industries.

Consultant B uses the following marketing message:

Are your new sales people slow in getting started and meeting their quota? We use the Fast Start Sales Training System that's guaranteed to help new sales people reach their quota in 60 days or less. Our customized system ensure that your salespeople meet or exceed their quota 82% more frequently than sales people who have not used our system. Proven in 107 industries, including yours, our system increases revenue per salesperson by an average of 63% in the first year.

Do you see the difference?

Consultant A talks about the training services he offers and the process he delivers. It is all about what he does, there is nothing about what the prospect gets. There is no inherent excitement in this message. And no matter how enthusiastically he delivers this message it will fail to generate excitement in the prospect.

Consultant B focuses his message on exactly what his prospects will receive from his sales training programs. Even though he offers the identical program, his message, expressed in the language of solutions and results, is inherently exciting. This consultant doesn't need to show wild enthusiasm for what he is offering, quiet confidence will do.

If you want your prospects to get excited about what you are offering, the magic key is to start talking about specific solutions and results. It's as simple at that, but it's amazing how many people miss this completely. Take a look at your own marketing messages, both verbal and written, and ask if they pass the excitement test. If they don't, work at making the necessary changes as quickly as possible. You'll start seeing results almost immediately.

Recap:

You will generate excitement with all your marketing messages and written marketing copy if you use the "What's In It For Me" copy. Put your information in the following order for best results.

1. Problem - Information on the problems, issues or challenges your prospects are facing.

2. Solution - Information on what things would be like if the problem, issue or challenge were resolved.

3. Offer - What do you have to offer that can address the problem and provide the solution.

4. Benefits - What are all the reasons your offer is the best solution for your clients?

5. Credibility - Who else has experienced your offer and gotten good results? What is your background and success record?

6. Action - What do you need to do next to take advantage of this offer?

To measure how strong your brand is copy and paste: (http://brandidentityguru.com/bightml/brandmasterpiece.html). Then click "Take the brand strength test". This is a short survey that measures the strength of any company's brand. It's a great tool to see where you are today.

Scott White is President of Brand Identity Guru (http://www.brandidentityguru.com), a leading brand consulting and market research firm located in Easton, Massachusetts, USA, near Boston. Brand Identity Guru specializes in creating corporate and product brands that increase sales, market share, customer loyalty, and brand valuation.

Over the course of his 15-year branding career, Scott White has worked in a wide variety of industries: high-tech, manufacturing, computer hardware and software, telecommunications, banking, restaurants, fashion, healthcare, Internet, retail, and service businesses, as well as numerous non-profit organizations.

Brand Identity Guru clients include: Sun Life Financial, Coca Cola, HP, Sun, Nordstrom, American Federal Mortgage, Simon (America's largest shopping mall manager) and many others, including numerous emerging growth companies.

Scott White is a very enthusiastic speaker and has the gift of being able to explain the principles of branding in a compelling and entertaining manner.