The biggest obstacle to owning a true brand — a position that sets you apart in the market — is the language you use.
Try this:
Look at five or six websites for companies in your industry, or look at their ads or collateral. Make a list of all the words and phrases they have in common.
That’ll be a long list — because nearly every company makes the same promises using the same language. Which makes establishing a strong brand unlikely.
Now try this:
Rewrite the copy for your own website, ads or collateral — without using any of those words or phrases. Try telling people why you’re better without relying on your industry’s clichés or popular phrases.
It’s hard, isn’t it?
But that’s the point. It’s easy to be one of the gang. To make the same promises. To use the same language. To sound like everyone else. But that’s the opposite of branding. It’s blending in.
The single most powerful thing you could do today to make it easier to sell more is to completely rethink your language. Because that will also make you rethink what you really want to be known for.
When you make a claim no one else is making, and use language no one else is using, you become impossible to overlook. Your message becomes very sticky. And selling gets easier.
Again, it’s hard. Really hard. If it wasn’t, everyone would do it. But that’s what makes it so powerful.
Why is Dwayne Johnson more pumped than everyone else?
Why was Apple able to produce so many game changers under Steve Jobs?
Why was 1960’s NASA able to meet what seemed like an impossible deadline?
They were willing to do what few others were willing to do. They pushed themselves into difficult, uncomfortable, even painful territory. And everyone knows who they are.
If you really want marketing that sells, use language that makes you stand out. Do the reps. Refine relentlessly. Push past the pain.
There’s a better, stronger brand waiting on the other side.