Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah! 13 Questions to Ask Yourself to Get Unique

Ben Bernie was an orchestra leader in the 1930's, who used to sign off his radio program with "Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah." It was his trademark and he became famous for that saying. Why? Because it was unique.

If you are struggling to build perceived value in your business then it's time to look at your uniqueness. The larger the sale you have to make with your business, the more you need to build up your perceived value. The key is to find that one unique feature on which you can hang all of your marketing materials.

Here's How You Do It
Start asking yourself some questions and start with these:

1. Who are the customers or my audience?


2. What should people feel when they come in contact with my offering?


3. What are my top three business values, other than honesty and quality?


4. What unique resources do I have that my competitors don't?


5. What do I aspire to accomplish for my customers?


6. If the sky were the limit, what might be possible with my business?


7. Do I have a unique model, system or process by which I operate?


8. What's my biggest weakness and how could that be my biggest strength?


9. What could be the potential risks, costs, or consequences to my customers by not doing business with me?


10. What are the top 5 questions asked by my potential customers?


11. What do my customers think must be done in order for them to be totally satisfied?


12. How does my offering give my customers momentum?


13. What is it my customers think I cannot do?

After asking these questions, you will most assuredly have jotted a list of multiple unique features about your business. Now compare that list with what your competitors are saying. Eliminate anything that sounds anything close to what they are saying.

Of the remaining items on the list, which one inspires you and would inspire your customers? There's your uniqueness. Now put that on all your marketing materials and never lead with anything else. This is what you are going to use to build perceived value in your business.

Note:
Thanks to Gerald Haman of Solution People for the inspiration of these questions. Gerald has created a truly unique pocket innovation tool call the KnowBrainer, which I use to help my clients devise unique solutions.

For more help on finding your uniqueness, see Connect the Dots: Building a True Brand, on our other blog: The Marketing Spot.

Related Posts:

1. Word of Mouth for a Realtor
2. Make the First Visit Count

For more information on our company: www.themarketingspot.com

Branding an Office Space

Case Study: New Haven Legal Centre

Idea Wanted: Re-brand an existing office space business.

Challenge: Take an existing local office space business national, and at the same time, change the vision of the business.

Background: 25 year old President Jonathan Arabolos has a passion to reinvent office space. Jon and his mother operate the New Haven Legal Centre in New Haven, Connecticut, an office building where over 90% of the clients are legal associated practices. But Jon has an enthusiasm to serve new businesses and entrepreneurs and he want to combine that enthusiasm with his passion and into a new office space concept. He also wants to expand his reach and take the concept national.

Advice: Branding is about being different in the mind of the consumer. But it's not just about saying your different, it's also about being different. Jon needs to take his values, his passion, and his vision and turn it into a business that's real. When you have a real business that's different, you can have a brand that stands out from the crowd. We are going to advise Jon to focus on being a different kind of office space for small businesses.

Ideas:

1. The Mission. The first step to branding is to identify your mission, based on your values. Jon's top three business values are flexibility, optimism and passion*. Now those values need to be turned into a mission that will have merit with the target client: small businesses, startups and entrepreneurs. The mission we identified in working with Jon is to "To be a fertilizing ground where businesses grow."

   *For the record: We do not allow clients to give us the value of honesty when going through the branding process. Honesty is assumed as a starting point for doing business long term. This rule also applies to quality. Never use honesty or quality in your marketing materials.

2. The Brand Promise. After a mission statement is developed, the next step is to develop a brand promise based on the vision Jon has for the company. Jon's big hairy vision is to brand office space nationwide. He wants to set up a network of entrepreneurs and be a hub for small businesses through office space. To accomplish this vision potential clients will have to see Jon as a resource. Our recommended Brand Promise for the re-branded company is for Jon to "Be the resource you need to make your office space successful."
   
   
3. Proving the Brand. Branding is not about constructing a make believe image. Real branding that lasts cannot be done with smoke, mirrors and pretty words. Sooner or later you have to prove your promise. Jon wants to be a resource. We believe the best way to do this is to assemble a hub of services that most small businesses need but don't necessarily know how to get.
   
   These essential services can include: Bookkeeping, legal help, office supplies, printing, computer repair. Jon would have approved company providers for each of these services and more. He could check references and negotiate rates up front. Then when a tenant needs some printing work, rather than wasting time calling around and getting bids, they just call the "company printer" and order what they want.
   
   Another value-added service he could offer is a free logo when you sign a lease for a designated term. New businesses rarely have a logo when they start, so they can get a logo and an office in one transaction. There are logo shops that provide logos for as little as $250.
   
   
4. New Name. Obviously New Haven Legal Centre is not going to cut it as a name for the newly re-branded national business. There are a million business naming theories out there, but my favorite is probably Seth Godin's Naming a Business. We did a little creative thinking to come up with a couple of different names:
   
   Maple Office Centers - We got the inspiration from Jon's name, Arabolos, which is close to the Spanish word for trees. A maple tree is a fast-growing strong tree with a good visual presence. It's easy to spell and pronounce and we think it has nice ring.
   Harvest Business Centers - This name has an obvious relationship to Jon's mission of being a 'fertilizing ground' for small businesses. It also has a positive connotation, is easy to spell and pronounce.
   


5. Get a Signature. With a Brand Promise and a new name, we need a signature. Most people call this a tag line or a slogan. But signatures have meaning and they are personal. A slogan is a clever saying, but a signature is personal. Good signatures should tie in nicely with the name of the business and give a clear indication of what a business offers.
   
   We think the signature here is obvious: 'The Fertilizing Ground for Businesses,' taken from Jon's mission. Now we connect the business name with the signature and we get:
   Maple Office Center - The Fertilizing Ground for Businesses
   


6. Key Visual. To put the finishing touch on this brand we need a key visual. Not talking about a logo here, you can learn more about that chore here: The Importance of a Logo in Branding.
   
   Key visuals provide a consistent theme throughout all your marketing materials. The key visual is the continuity of your communication with the customer. We think the new brand's key visual needs to revolve around a hub. John wants to build a network of entrepreneurs and be a hub for them so the hub visual seems natural.
   
   If name of the business is Maple Office Center, use a maple tree as the center of the hub and extend spokes out to icons that reference the different resources. You can visualize what it might look like by applying your imagination to the this computer network graphic (sorry, we're not going to show you the graphic we would do).

The Lesson: Why go through the whole mission, vision, brand promise exercise? Lasting brands are built on values and passion, they are what we call 'True Brands.' You can see the process we went through for Jonathan Arabolos and his quest for a new brand. When we identified his values, mission, vision and brand promise up front, the rest of the process really became quite easy. That's because we didn't have to make things up. We were building a true brand.

To learn more about this process and branding your small business, we highly recommend Microbranding: Build a Powerful Personal Brand and Beat Your Competition, by Scott Gross.


For more small business marketing lessons and advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
To learn more about our company, see our website: www.themarketingspot.com

Branding a Law Practice

Case Study: Kenneth Alan Forman PA, Immigration Attorney in North Miami Beach, Florida

Challenge: Re-brand a law practice that has recently expanded and has a vision of national influence.

Idea Wanted: A brand that will increase business from immigrants facing deportation, coupled with an image that carries weight across the entire country.

The Background: Ken Forman, the principal of the practice, has been in operation for more than 18 years and has just added his daughter to the practice. The goal is to expand the business to become the go-to practice defending deportation from immigration courts on a national scale.

His business values: Competence, Honesty, Protection
His Mission: To help immigrants who deserve to be here fight against the immigration courts trying to deport them.

Advice: Think through they eyes of the potential client and think big! Forman's clients are immigrants facing deportation and the firm has the vision of national reach.

To market to this specialized client you have to identify their key concerns and fears. Forman's clients are washed in fear and uncertainty. The objective is to communicate comfort, security and hope.

Our Ideas:

1. First develop the brand promise and use it as the foundation of all future marketing. We suggest the brand promise: "Safety, Security, Peace of Mind in America."
   
2. Next develop a signature that can be used in all future marketing materials. A signature is not a slogan or a tagline, because it is personal and has meaning. We suggest: "Stop Deportation, Stay in America" or "Stop Deportation, Go with Forman"
   
3. Brands need key, central visuals to reinforce the brand promise and the signature. Our recommendation for the Forman key visual is a large red, white and blue image of America with the texture of a big brick wall. In the wall their is a door open with a deportation sign above it. The two principals of the practice are blocking the front of the exit with their arms crossed. The signature is underneath the visual.
   
4. Change name and use big, important sounding titles. Adding significant staff is the perfect time to change the name of the business, especially if you want to change your target market. Because of Forman's desire to go national, we suggest an authoritative name such as the Forman and Lugo National Immigrant Rights Center, or Forman Immigrants Protection Center. Create initiatives such as the National Initiative to stop unjust deportation and publish a document backing it up.


5. Get a website. Forman currently has no website. Luckily some their large national competitors have weak websites and it would be easy to make an impact. We suggest a new website with a splash page that contains the key graphic and the signature in multiple languages. Then beneath the key visual, have a "Choose Your Language" option that includes English and the top three languages served by the practice. Don't clutter the website up with confusing options.: make it simple. Publish a document in multiple languages that chronicles a typical time line and lists immigrants rights. Then convert it to a pdf and make it easily downloadable.


6. Open satellite offices. Forman wants national reach and needs an appearance of national accessibility. Open small "storefront" offices in key immigration court cities like Los Angeles and New York. Staff them with a receptionist or use an answering service to save costs. Use a VOIP Internet phone service and obtain local Los Angeles and New York phone numbers that ring in the North Miami Beach office.

The Lesson:
When branding your business, start with your values and then develop a brand promise that clarifies what you promise to deliver beyond the stuff you happen to sell. After you have your brand promise, develop your signature; a slogan with teeth.

Always develop a vision statement of what you want your business to look like when your mission is completed. If you know what the future will look like, then you can craft your image and a brand that rings true. In Forman's example, you cannot have a vision of influence on a national scale and portray a country lawyer image, or try to maintain a personal brand.

Brand your business in orderly steps, starting with values, a mission, a vision, and then a brand promise. When you do, the big imaging ideas begin to flow more easily.

If you would like to get free marketing ideas for your business, fill out our idea spot form by clicking here.

Get more small business marketing lessons and advice at our other blog: The Marketing Spot

Learn more about our company at our website: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Branding a Bakery

Case Study: Independent, one woman bakery in Central Texas.
Challenge: Create a brand that will give the business an identity.
Idea Wanted: Brand the business so that it gets more business.

The Background: This small, independent bakery has been in business for four years. It is named for, and run by, the owner; a young Italian woman who came to the states to go to school and ended up starting a business.

She gets the largest slice of her business from making wedding and special occasion cakes, although she also bakes gourmet cookies and pastries.

Her frustration is, that while she has a core of loyal customers, she is still not widely known in the community and not many people know exactly what she does. Her lone effort to market herself is through an email list she compiles from customers who come into her store.

Advice: Create a brand for the bakery by first developing a brand promise and then a signature slogan that crystalizes the image of the business for consumers.

To do this we took the business through our brand promise development process:

• First, identify the top three values under which you operate your company. Her top three values were: family, honesty, passion.
• Second, develop a mission (not a mission statement) for the business. Her mission was to heighten the experience of any event where her cakes were served.
• Third, create a vision of the business when it fulfills that mission. Her vision was to be the baker of choice for special occasions in Central Texas.
• Fourth, write the brand promise based on your values, your mission and your vision

After the brand promise is developed, craft a signature from the brand promise that vividly communicates the brand to potential customers.

Our Ideas:
1. Brand Promise: To create memorable cakes for events that people will remember and talk about long after the event is over.
2. Signature: "Creating Cakes that Create Memories"

The Lesson:
Brands need to be built on the truth. There is nothing more true than your values, because they are what they are. Take the time to articulate your mission (your purpose for being in business) and your vision (the eventual destination of your dream). Going through this process guarantees that you end up with a true brand, not one concocted by a marketing spinmeister.

You will also find that if you are willing to do the tough thinking, it's actually easy to build a brand about which customers can become excited. Your dreams are big and exciting and so is your brand. Your big, exciting brand will also be sustainable because it was founded on the truth.

To get your free marketing idea, fill out this form and submit.

For small business marketing advice and musings, check out our other blog: The Marketing Spot.

To contact us, see our website: http://www.themarketingspot.com/