Brand Development and Your Marketing Message

PLEASE PRINT OUT THIS ENTIRE WORKBOOK

AND DO THE EXERCISES

Learning Outcomes:

Upon completion, learners will be able to…

1. Define a Unique Selling Proposition statement that

differentiates you from your competitors.

2. Design/Refine your company Tagline, Slogan, and

Marketing Message.

3. Identify who are your ideal prospects.

4. Express company stories as marketing messages to attract

your ideal guests.

M A R K E T I N G

M E S S A G E

W O R K B O O K

Why is Your USP so Important

One of the most important things a real estate professional can do

to grow their business is identify what makes them unique in the

marketplace.

Identifying, developing, and incorporating your USP into everything

you do is challenging. But the reward is worth every effort. It will

differentiate you, distinguish you, and give you an advantage over

everyone in your marketplace.

It’s so important because the market is saturated with real estate investors and many (dare I say “most”?) offer almost exactly the same service

Real estate investors buy houses in a way that isn’t too different from other investors. (There might be some differences, but often it’s not enough for the clients to spot them easily).

A USP is not merely a slogan — it is your company's DNA and reason for being, If you cannot summarize exactly what sets you apart in one or two sentences, you are not unique enough within your marketplace."

There's a lot of confusing rhetoric in the market as to what is a 'Tag

Line' and what is a 'Unique Selling Proposition'

Understanding the difference between a tagline and a slogan is

essential to coming up with the proper choice of words for your

company. Confusing the two can confuse your customers.

A tagline is a short, powerful phrase that is associated with your

company name. It represents the tone and feeling you want for your

products or services. It is often part of your company graphics e.g.

the logo and letterhead. It stays with you all the time. It'll only change

when you want to totally redefine your company. In many cases the

tagline becomes so well known that it is instantly recognizable.

Example of Disneyland’s tagline: The happiest place on Earth.

A slogan is slightly different. It’s also a few words that bring your

company to mind, but are intended to be less long lasting. The

word slogan comes from a Scottish word meaning "battle cry."

Your slogan goes with the battle you are waging right now. That

means slogans are often used for one campaign.

A slogan may change regularly according to your campaigns to

advertise a specific aspect of a product or service, while a

company tagline is used consistently for a company as a whole.

Because slogans change often, they are usually current and

modern. It gives an impression of being new and trendy. Some

marketers refer to slogans as product taglines, as opposed to

company taglines.

Example of Disneyland’s slogans from some of its campaigns:

"Where dreams come true"

"I'm going to Disneyland”

"Where the magic began"

"Happiest homecoming on Earth"

Attracting customers isn’t something you “bolt on” in the end. It’s something you work on at every stage of your business, and your unique selling proposition is the first stage.

CLIENTS DON’T SEE THE DIFFERENCE

There’s no motivation or loyalty among clients because they do not perceive a significant difference between service providers –one real estate investor looks very similar to another.

When customers don’t perceive a difference, they don’t care who they call and they’ll go with whatever is most convenient for them – whoever happens to have an office closer to their home or whoever happens to be at the top of their mind when they pick up the phone to call.

Take control of your brand and your reputation. Be different than the rest and you’ll glue your name in your customers’ minds for the next time they need your services.

So how DO you demonstrate your difference? How DO you prove to prospects that they should sign with you right now because they’ll never find anyone like you again? How DO you prove to customers that it’s worth driving across town to do business with you even when there are other professionals who are located closer to them?

This workbook is designed to help you define your ideal client and

then to take the next step is to make a list of the needs or wants that

your target client has and the benefits that your product or service

uniquely provides. How is your solution different from every other

product on the market? This will be your unique selling

proposition or USP.

A USP — “Unique Selling Proposition” — is a way to understand that difference.

INTRODUCING THE USP

There’s a good chance that you’ve heard of a USP even if you haven’t identified one for yourself.

A USP is a comprehensive statement about what makes you different than anyone else in your industry. When you state your USP, it should describe you and only you, and it shouldn’t describe anyone else.

A USP is not a slogan or tagline. You might never actually say your USP to people. But the message of your USP should be loud and clear in everything you do. Most importantly (and this is the part that many real estate professionals miss), a USP should describe only you.

When I say it should describe only you, here’s what I mean: Let’s say that you contact with a prospect once and then months later that person is ready to make a move. The problem is that customers might not be able to remember your actual name. But if you have a strong, dynamic USP, there’s a better chance they’ll remember that and it might be enough for them to find you.

So if your USP currently is something like “I care about my customers and wouldn’t recommend that they invest in anything that I wouldn’t invest in myself” or “I’ll sell my client’s homes with the same care and attention that I’d sell my own home” then you don’t have a Unique Selling Proposition. Sorry. All you have is a half-baked statement that doesn’t stand up and call attention to you. It calls attention to just about every professional out there.

A USP should work like this: It should be able to describe you to the point where it excludes almost everyone else who could be a direct competitor. (Sure, there might be a financial advisor in Arkansas who has a similar USP or there might be a real estate investor in Alaska who has exactly the same USP as you, but if you’re doing business anywhere else, they’re not direct competitors).

To borrow USPs from other industries, consider how Apple products are extremely user friendly and owning an Apple product gives users a sense of community. Or, consider how Google “owns” the idea of being the first choice in search, even though there are lots of other search engines out there.

WHEN DO YOU USE YOUR USP?

You may or may not ever state your USP in your marketing. However, you will use your USP as the foundation for everything else in your business – your brand and all of its elements (like your slogan, your logo, your brand colors, your brand attitude, your brand concept, your brand promise, etc.), as well as your marketing and deliverables.

Your USP, therefore is one of the building blocks on which you will create your business and it will enable you to sell more: When your clients are asked by their friends why they chose you to help them, your USP will probably be a key reason.

Think of your USP not as a tagline but as a framework on which you’ll build your brand.

STEP 1: FIGURE OUT WHO YOU ARE

To write create a USP, you need to figure out who you are. Yeah, we’re really going back to basics here but you’ll thank me for it.

Go get a big pile of 3×5 cards. Using the list below, write down at least one thing that describes you in that area. (Preferably, write down several things – one on each card).

• Education • Experience • Expertise • Skills/Talent • Interests • Credentials • Methodology • Deliverables • Target market • Personality

If possible, write several cards for each topic like below

Write down as many descriptions as you can think of for each of the areas listed above. (Note that I’ve included two interests of mine — “beer” and “poker” — along with several other more professional elements like my education and experience).

Spend some time doing this. Don’t try to squeeze the entire exercise into a half hour. Force yourself to go deeper. Education and experience might be easy but the other stuff may prove to be slightly more challenging. When I did this very exercise, I uncovered some compelling ideas I hadn’t considered but it took some digging.

STEP 2: MIX TO DISCOVER POTENTIAL USP’S

Now that you’ve written down who you are on several 3×5 cards, it’s time to figure out how you can be different. In this step, you’re going to select just a few of the elements to highlight in your USP. Just because you highlight a few elements doesn’t eliminate the others. However, it’s good to highlight just a few – it will make your brand development and marketing easier, and it will make you more memorable.

So, shuffle the cards together and select a few at once, laying them out in front of you. Try dealing out 2-5 in a batch and seeing what sticks. You should see one of the following combinations:

• Groups of cards that don’t make sense together. That’s okay. It happens. Creativity requires a lot of failures.|

• Groups of cards that don’t really make sense but are maybe the start of something. Good! Write down that combination for later!

• Groups of cards that nicely capture something about what you do in a unique way. Excellent!

On a separate sheet of paper, write down the combination if it seems good or great then reshuffle the cards and deal out another 2-5 cards.

At the end of this part of the exercise you should have dealt out dozens of combinations and you should have a few (hopefully a handful of at least 4-7 card-groups) that you can work with.

These are the starting points and you’ll work with them and narrow them down into just one great USP.

Here are some examples:

This is an example of a jazz-loving real estate professional in the Dallas/Fort Worth area:

And here’s an example of a financial advisor who has a combination of interests that seem related:

The examples above show a few “starting points” that a financial advisor and a real estate investor might build from to create their USP.

STEP 3: TAKE IT UP A NOTCH

Now you’re just getting warmed up! The next step is to give these some zing. Turn them into something special by tightening them up a little. You don’t have to polish them perfectly (because you’re only going to choose one from the group you have), but this process helps you to think a little further about them.

To make each one better, try doing some of the following:

• Try making it more specific rather than just a few words strung together: “I’m the jazz saxophone real estate agent”.

• Dust off your copywriting skills and compress the group of words down to a tight sentence that nicely summarizes how you are different.

• Tie your USP in with something familiar. The James-Bond-style USP (pictured as an example earlier) is familiar enough but there might be other things you can use – a famous character or landmark are handy. Just be careful of trademarks.

• Start your sentence with declaration. For example, “I am the only real estate agent who…” or “The ONLY real estate investor that _____________.”

• Identify a group of words that you can “own”. Think of this group of words as a keyword set in Google. So when someone types in those keywords, your name (and ONLY your name) appears in the Google search.

• Give it an edge. If “real estate investor” is too blasé, see if you can find something that means the same thing but says it in a different way. Will “Home Sale Expert” help to separate you by clearly identify a specific area of expertise? The “Jazz-loving Home Sale Expert” sounds much more dynamic and memorable than “real estate investor”.

You can also add some other elements to help you narrow your USP in different ways. For example, try narrowing your USP by geography…

or try combining one focus with another, like I’ve shown below…

or try narrowing your USP by some other specialty…

Now it’s time to rate each potential USP on a quick-and-dirty scale of “I don’t like it”, “It’s a decent starting point”, and “I really like this”. Get rid of the ones you don’t like. See if you can’t tweak the decent batch. Try to end up with 2-4 USPs that you can move forward with.

To further help development of a USP, try things including:

• Put yourself in your customers' shoes: Step back from your daily operations and carefully scrutinize what your customers really want. The answer might be quality, convenience, reliability, friendliness, cleanliness, courtesy or customer service.

• Know what motivates your customers' behavior and buying

decisions: You need to know what drives and motivates customers. Go beyond the traditional customer demographics, such as age, gender, race, income and geographic location that most businesses collect to analyze their sales trends.

• Uncover the real reasons customers buy your product instead of a competitor's: As your business grows, you'll be able to ask your best source of information —your customers. You will be surprised how honest people are when you ask how you can improve your service.

Then it’s time to figure out what other people think.

STEP 4: VALIDATE YOUR FINDINGS

Validating your potential USPs will help you to narrow the field even further. The two easiest ways to validate your findings is to validate against competitors and validate with customers.

Validate against competitors: Using a list of local professionals who compete directly with you, compare each of your potential USPs to each competitor. Are they actually Unique (to you) Selling Propositions? If you used them as your USP, would they only describe you or could they describe someone else?

For example, if your USP was something like: “I’m the real estate professional who loves the art of the deal” – well that sounds great but we can make the safe assumption that most of your real estate competitors love the art of the deal (or would at least tell their clients that they do).

Compare each of your potential USPs to each of your competitors. This might sound like a long step but it will probably go faster than you realize.

Validate with clients: Validating with customers is a little trickier but not impossible. For example, you can write articles around the specific USP and post them on your website then measure traffic. Or if you have the time and/or financial budget, you can easily test this with Google AdWords. Create one AdWords ad for each USP and run them for a short period of time. Then measure click-through rates to see how people respond.

Or, if you don’t mind just asking your clients then just ask them! That’s easy enough. Say something like: “I’m designing some marketing for the upcoming season and I wondered which of these 5 descriptions really jumps out at you?“, and, “if you had to describe me to your friends, which of these 5 descriptions would most describe me?“. It’s good to ask both questions because the first question separates you from the USP to ask about marketability and memorability, while the second question asks them to identify how congruent you are with the USP.

If you ask your clients, you should ask a few. Don’t base your decision on just one or two clients. And, just because they pick one doesn’t mean you have to choose that one. But their input will be

informative. Perhaps they’ll give good advice about one USP that you eventually weave into a different USP.

STEP 5: GUT CHECK. WILL IT WORK FOR YOU?

Now that you’ve done some leg-work in creating and then validating your potential USPs, you should have narrowed your USPs down to just a couple of really strong ones.

Your next question needs to be: Can you support this USP? By that I mean: Will you be able to build a brand and marketing content around this USP? And, can you live with this USP?

In most cases, creating brand and marketing content around a USP should be possible… but you might find a potential USP you really like that doesn’t lend itself well to a brand.

The great challenge, though, will be “can you live with this USP?” In other words, what will your response be if someone calls you up out of the blue and just quotes your USP back to you? For example, “Are you the real estate investor who wears the chicken costume?” What happens if your friends or family find out what your USP is. Can you live with that? I’ve found this question to be quite challenging at times and have scrapped several potential USPs because I realized that I didn’t want to be known as that 5 or 10 years down the road.

STEP 6: NARROW IT DOWN

At this point, you should only have a couple of potential USPs that are really compelling, have been validated against competitors and with clients, and are USPs that you can get excited about. Now it’s time to pick one. If you’re really unsure, it might be worth doing some more testing (maybe using Google AdWords or asking more clients). Do this until you have one. Just one. One big, shiny, happy, awesome, compelling USP that describes you and only you.

HERE’S WHAT TO DO NEXT

Now that you have your USP, you’re ready to start building your brand and your marketing. Here’s how:

• Create a slogan or tagline that hints at your USP • Revisit your professional photographs to make sure that they

reflect your USP • Rewrite your bio content and create your “About Me” page to

reflect your USP. • Make it a point to weave elements of your USP into all of your

marketing content, no matter what the channel • Identify a keyword or keyphrase that you can “own” in Google

that relates to your USP.

From there, continue to incorporate your USP into everything. Make sure that all content that leaves your office communicates at least some aspect of your USP in some way.

Marketing and Promotion is an important part of building a big

audience, there’s no question. But promotion alone can’t entirely

make up for a for the lack of a unique selling proposition. That

would be like putting lipstick on a pig!

Creating Your Marketing Message

Your message strategy is the foundation for building a successful

business. Without a clear message, your marketing efforts will fail.

Having a good message is like having a good story that engages an

audience to keep reading and following. Take them on a journey in

your story.

And a message begins with a story or a “why.” What’s your story or

“why”? A story and message help you then create and execute a

strong positioning (or mission) statement.

Having a strong message strategy and positioning statement will

make it easier to deliver a consistent message across many different

marketing channels.

A positioning statement identifies your ideal client, paints a picture

of how you want your brand to be perceived and addresses your

ideal clients’ biggest challenges or problems by stating the outcome

you can provide by solving their problems.

You don’t control the position your brand occupies — your

customers do. But you can influence the perception of your brand by

deciding which positions you have the best chance of occupying and

defending based on the strengths of your brand.

Here are Guidelines for Good Positioning Statements

Your positioning statement should be a short sentence that

declares one primary benefit that your ideal client will receive as a

result of working with you.

Use support points to unfold your story in more detail. They help

explain your positioning statement and answer questions like, “how

do you deliver the benefit promised in the positioning statement?”

Repeating your message strategy over and over is the most

important factor in successful marketing. While you might get tired of

your message strategy long before your ideal client may even listen

to it or notice it. Repetition is how you own a position, and your

message strategy should remain unchanged for at least 18 months,

and ideally longer, much longer.

Recommendations for creating a good positioning statement

• Make it a compelling and conceptual statement of one big

benefit that is simple, memorable, and without jargon

• Support it three or four additional benefit claims

• It should include four evaluation criteria: unique, believable,

important and usable

• Tailor it to your target market

• Provide an easily understood picture of your brand that

differentiates it from your competitors.

• Keep it is credible for your brand can deliver on its promise.

• Position your brand as the sole occupier of this particular

position in the market. You can “own” it.

• It should leave room for growth

• A good positioning statement will help you evaluate whether or

not marketing decisions are consistent with and supportive of

your brand.

Positioning Statement Exercise/Template

[Fill in your information]:

Our product/service is a (describe the product or solution):

That provides (cite the breakthrough capability):

For (ideal clients/customers):

Who (have the following problem/need):

Unlike (reference competition):

Our product/solution (describe the key point of competitive

differentiation):

IDENTIFY YOUR IDEAL CLIENT/CUSTOMER

Our definition of “ideal client” or customer is someone who not

only needs and wants what we offer but is aligned with the

culture of our company and our “why”.

A great example for this is Apple. They have a very specific

customer who is aligned with Apple’s (or Steve Job’s) “why” of

not conforming or following the status quo.

Your ideal customer is someone who you want as a customer

and vice versa … and they see the value in what you offer.

Start by creating a profile of your ideal client by answering the

questions on the following page:

IDEAL CLIENT/CUSTOMER PROFILE

Ask yourself what characteristics would your ideal customers and

clients have in the areas below. Be as specific as possible.

- Age

- Gender

- Qualities/Characteristics

- Problems / Stresses- Work Style

- Home/Marital/Family Life

Other Psychographic Characteristics

IDENTIFY YOUR IDEAL CLIENT/CUSTOMER

Based on the ideal client profile you filled out, try to narrow it down

to three ideal clients or customers to target in your marketing and

sales efforts. Fill out below.

Descriptions Where/How To Target

1.__________________________________

2.__________________________________

3.__________________________________

IDEAL CLIENT/CUSTOMER AVATAR

Choose one profile/description and create an avatar.

Give him/her/them a name, describe him/her/them in detail and

write a paragraph as if you were talking for them. How do they

speak and behave?

You’re trying to re-create their language to creating a marketing

message that will resonate with them. Write in their words and

jargon.

Write 5-7 lines here:

Your Personal or Company “Backstory”

Answer the following questions about

yourself or about the business you own or

run:

Do you have extra industry Experience?

Do you have a background in other industries?

Do you carry and additional credentials?

Do you have any additional qualifications?

Do you do anything above and beyond the industry standard?

Do you have an above average track record?

Do you service any specific areas?

Do you service any specific demographic/group?

Do you have a service guarantee?

Do you do anything proactively that others don’t?

Whatever your unique selling proposition is, you should be able

to clearly state what differentiates you from the competition. If you

don’t, someone else will.

Truly strong and effective USPs should become the single most

compelling benefit you provide your clients. These are what are

going to make clients sign the paper work with you and choose

you, so make it good.

Who are you? Describe yourself or the persona of your business.

What do you do you provide to customers/clients?

(product/service)?

Where are you or your business geographically from or located?

What are your or your business’s Triumphs/Accomplishments?

What are your or your business’s Tribulations / Challenges /

Failures?

What excites you, as a business?

What annoys/upsets you, as a business?

What do you wish/hope for your customers and clients?

What is your “Why” - why do you do what you do in life and

business?

Your Personal Storyline (Message)

Every awesome business or leader has an awesome story. Use the

backstory exercise answers to create your story and MESSAGE.

Once Upon A Time (your current state/situation as the “hero” of

your story) …

Then One Day (Strategy/Plan/Occurrence) …

And Because of That (Consequence/Take Away/Result of the plan)

…

And Because of That (Consequence/Take Away/Result of the plan

of the previous) …

And Then Finally (Climax/Turning Point) …

And Ever Since Then (Vision/Future/New Result or Outcome)

And The Moral of the Story Is (Ultimate Result /Outcome/ Learning)

Your Personal Storyline (Message)

Every awesome business or leader has an awesome story. Use the

backstory exercise answers to create your story and MESSAGE.

Once Upon A Time (your current state/situation as the “hero” of

your story) …

Then One Day (Strategy/Plan/Occurrence) …

And Because of That (Consequence/Take Away/Result of the plan)

…

And Because of That (Consequence/Take Away/Result of the plan

of the previous) …

And Then Finally (Climax/Turning Point) …

And Ever Since Then (Vision/Future/New Result or Outcome) …

And The Moral of the Story Is (Ultimate Result/Outcome/Learning)

How To Create A Great

Tagline For Your

Business (w/ Examples)

When talking about a "Tagline" for a business, you'll commonly

hear some popular names cited such as:

The taglines examples you'll see are typically that of ginormous

brands.

But that's the problem with these examples...

They're all HUGE PUBLIC COMPANIES!

Every single one of these examples has been around for decades

and is worth billions of dollars, yet somehow people think their

much smaller businesses should have equally vague brand

taglines.

Well before we build our billion dollar brands, we might wanna start

a little smaller:

The Evolution of a Tagline:

Let's you and I start a little side business together. Let's see how

our tagline may change as our company grows in size.

Notice how the tagline grows from a "descriptive tagline" into a

more"aspirational tagline" here:

At that very beginning stage when we're at $0/year, having a

vague tagline such as "Tell the world" will be relatively useless

to us.

However once we start closing gigantic deals, have that fancy

office on 5th Avenue in New York, and handle marketing for

Fortune 500 brands.....then maybe "Tell the world" is a more

appropriate tagline!

So yes, when you're at the level of a large business, your tagline

will often be something short and clever and "aspirational."

However, if you're not there juuusst yet, here's a quick formula to

follow:

Here's the 3-step process for creating a

tagline:

Step 1.) Dump out your entire business in a few sentences.

Step 2.) Trim it down.

Step 3.) Trim it down some more.

The #1 best way to create a tagline for your business is to

describe what you do in the shortest space possible.

This process is like trying to cram a large thought into a single

Tweet. Let's jump into some examples of how we would do this:

WeWork Tagline Example:

Step 1.) Dump out your entire business in a few

sentences:

"WeWork is a community space where people can

co-work together or rent larger private offices. We

let you do what you love by providing fast internet

access, bathroom facilities, coffee, beer, and

meeting spaces."

Step 2.) Trim it down:

"A community space where you can focus on what

you love doing, and we will handle all the hassles of

running an office."

Step 3.) Trim it down some more:

"Do what you love."

Think of your tagline like a "Headline For Your Business."

Your tagline will often be placed on things like:

● Flyers

● Stationary

● Outdoor signs

● Business cards

● Website headers

These are items that have only a quick-shot at getting someone

more interested.

For this reason, the only job of your tagline is to get attention

and make your customer want to read/research more!

If you have spent more than two hours trying to come up with a

tagline for your business, you are definitely focusing on the wrong

thing.

Use the 3-Step Tagline Formula shown above, knock your tagline

out, make sure it's not "too clever", and then focus on improving

your business in REAL ways!

With all that said, I do respect some taglines floating around out

there.

For example, here's my all time favorite tagline:

Geico has gone through all sorts of cutesy characters as their

"spokesman", but their tagline has remained the same:

"15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance."

This tagline kicks butt because it's jam-packed with important

stuff....and only in about 10 words!

Dang.....that Gecko knows what he's doing!

Let's just compare this brilliant Geico tagline to a few of their top

competitors in the insurance space....Statefarm and Allstate:

I mean, without having previous experience knowing what these

companies do…..would you have ANY clue what they sell based

off their tag lines?? No.

Bravo Geico. Your tagline could be used for a $100/year

insurance business or a $50Billion/year insurance business.

So remember, use the 3-Step Tagline Formula from above to

create a quick tagline and description for your own business:

The 3-Step Tagline Formula

Step 1.) Dump out your entire business in a few sentences.

Step 2.) Trim it down.

Step 3.) Trim it down some more.

Branding, Design and Messaging

Once you’ve developed your brand messaging, your job is to

communicate it clearly and often.

That’s the role of branding, design and messaging. A great name,

tagline and design can really tie this whole concept of uniqueness

together.

Integrate Your USP into Everything You Do

Once you have put some careful thought to your USP and have

developed it, you need to integrate it into everything you do. Your

USP should be found somewhere in your headlines, body copy of

ads, direct-mail, emails, name cards, websites, signboards, and

yellow pages. You should repeat it clearly and consistently in every

one of your marketing communications. You can't over do or wear

out your USP, especially if it's powerful.

And remember that the USP isn’t a one-time decision. You have to

constantly remind people of what you stand for. Tell them in no

uncertain terms on a regular basis why your business is different.

CAN YOU SUCCEED WITHOUT A DYNAMITE USP?

Yes, of course it’s possible to succeed without a great unique selling

proposition, a tagline, and a story. It’s possible, but it’s not easy. And

success without a marketing message requires better promotion,

along with some outside factors (maybe a little luck).

Sometimes there is so much demand in a market that multiple

(virtually identical) businesses can succeed without working hard to

differentiate themselves. In these cases, you have a great product

and a way to reach the market, you might be able to break through.

WHAT IS YOUR

MARKETING MESSAGE?

Please email me your USP, Tagline, Story, Avatar at dwierman@gmail.com for review