Your Intangible USP
Archives: Daily Issues
Issue #2601
- WEALTHY: A primer in personal branding (Bob Bly)
- HEALTHY: 6 ways to maintain muscle mass (
f="http://www.earlytorise.com/author/dr-al-sears/">Dr. Al Sears) - WISE: David Ogilvy on “image”
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- How to meet the next Will Smith or Steve Jobs (Brendan Florez)
- Financial advice to pass on (Ben Stein)
- It’s Good to Know… is that ad watching you?
- Add “esurient” to your vocabulary
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“You now have to decide what ‘image’ you want for your brand. Image means personality. Products, like people, have personalities, and they can make or break them in the marketplace.”
David Ogilvy
Your Intangible USP
By Bob Bly
Your business – whether you are an information marketer, retailer, catalog merchant, manufacturer, service provider, freelancer, or consultant – has not one but two unique selling propositions (USPs): the tangible and the intangible.
The tangible USP is the visible, quantifiable (or at least describable) differentiator between you and your competitors. Because it can be seen, felt, described, and grasped, the tangible USP is the one you feature in your marketing copy.
Example: Years ago, before digital cameras were invented, Polaroid’s USP was that its cameras produced instant pictures. With all other cameras, you had to take the film someplace to get it developed. But with Polaroid, the picture would develop when exposed to air in about a minute.
The intangible USP, for most entrepreneurs as well as many larger companies, is your personality and reputation. In the corporate marketing world, it might be called your “image.”
The intangible benefit can be just as important in closing sales and attracting repeat business as the tangible benefit. Yet it takes a secondary place in marketing copy, if it is there at all. The reason is that an intangible USP is difficult to describe in a way that is clear and compelling – even though it may be enormously valuable.
For instance, TP owns a camera store near my office that sells the same cameras as just about every other camera store. Many of the big chains sell those cameras at lower prices and carry a wider selection. That gives them a tangible advantage over TP.
But TP has several advantages over them – which translates into several intangible benefits for his customers.
TP is a successful semi-professional photographer whose work has been widely published. (He specializes in photographing fires and firefighters.) The most obvious benefit to the customer is his superior advice and guidance on camera selection and usage. But there’s another, even less tangible, benefit: When you go to TP’s store, you can talk photography with him, and his enthusiasm is contagious.
Being around TP, a professional who takes pride in his work – both as a photographer and a store owner – gives you a sense of camaraderie with a fellow shutterbug. It makes you eager to improve as an amateur photographer and eventually master the craft. These are goals that TP can help you achieve, both with the products he sells and the advice he dispenses for free.
I see a parallel between TP’s photo shop and the business of marketing information products, an area of interest to many ETR readers.
The tangible USP of an information product is usually inherent in either the content of the product itself or the credentials of the product’s author. You can also build a tangible USP into the offer.
For example, Prentice Hall was selling a book on how to create a marketing plan. The offer included a 30-day free trial of the book: If you did not like the book, you returned it within 30 days for a refund.
The copywriter who wrote the direct-mail package to sell the book realized that a customer could get the book, follow the instructions, and then return the book within 30 days for refund – in essence, getting a free marketing plan. So he used this as the USP in the headline of his sales letter: “Create a Breakthrough Marketing Plan in 30 Days – Guaranteed or Your Money Back.”
But when you are an information marketer, especially on the Internet, you also have an intangible USP that becomes important to your customers. That USP is who you are – your personality. Some marketing experts call it your “personal brand.”
It is an old axiom in selling that customers prefer to do business with people they know and like. So the more you come across as someone your customers respect and trust, the more they will seek your advice – and, in turn, the more products they will buy from you.
Unlike consumer brands (e.g., Pillsbury and their Doughboy), successful personal brands are not manufactured by advertising agencies. They are natural reflections of the marketer – his personality, experiences, beliefs, strengths, prejudices, opinions, and attitudes.
To use your personal brand to your advantage, it is best to be true to yourself – to be the person you really are, rather than to fabricate some artificial persona you think more people will like and buy from.
In matters of personal branding, heed motivational speaker Rob Gilbert’s formula: SWL + SWL = SW. This stands for: “Some will like you and your products. Some won’t like you and your products. So what?”
Be yourself. It’s the only personal brand you can pull off with credibility. If you try to be someone you’re not, your customers will sense it in everything you write or say and distance themselves from you.
Yes, your persona will attract some customers and repulse others. But SWL + SWL = SW.
The number of loyal readers and fans you attract by being yourself will be more than sufficient to earn a handsome living by selling information products to your core mailing list.
One more thing: Your persona or personal brand is established primarily in your communications with your prospects and customers. On the Internet, these communications include your e-newsletter… e-mail marketing messages… transactional e-mails… website… landing pages… blog… teleseminars… customer service e-mails and phone calls… FaceBook account… YouTube videos… and, of course, your information products.
So while it makes sense to develop your own style in written and spoken communications, you should always present your best, most positive, self – the “you” that is most helpful, friendly, and caring about your readers’ success.
That’s something your customers will like. A lot.
[Ed. Note: Bob Bly is the author of more than 70 books and an undisputed master of the art of selling.
This March, Bob will reveal his top secrets - to a select few - on how to effectively apply powerful persuasion techniques in all of your marketing efforts... making your customers want to pull out their wallets every time you communicate with them. Will you be one of the elite who get access to this special event? Find out here...
And don't forget to subscribe to Bob's free e-zine, The Direct Response Letter, and claim your free gift worth $116.]
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Online Success To Be Handed To Small Group of ETR Readers
Selling online is an essential part of any successful business today. Even the best products and services can end up in the proverbial dustbin if you can’t communicate value well enough to encourage people to open their wallets and buy.
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If selling more online matters to you, here’s where you can get the details…
One Easy Way to Grow Your Social Network
With the economy in a downturn, people are looking to build their businesses more cost-effectively. One way to do this is to grow and manage your social network.
Many successful people got their start as a result of making key connections. Steve Jobs and Stephen Wozniak met on a summer job while teens. Abbot and Costello met at a bar. Will Smith got his start as the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air when he asked the vice-president of Warner Brothers for directions in a parking lot.
To begin growing your social network, find people that sociologists call connectors. In his book The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell talks about the importance of connectors in creating trends.
These same people can help build your social network.
Connectors come in two types – social connectors and value connectors.
Social connectors are people who are highly social and socially savvy. They are members of multiple social circles, and are often able to introduce people from different circles to one another.
Value connectors are people who have influence or access to scarce resources. This would include well-known business leaders (with influence) and politicians (with access to grants, permits, and the like).
Identify connectors within your social circle, and get to know them better. Take them out to lunch, offer to help them with a project, or just invite them to grab a drink. The key here is to offer value to them without asking for (or even expecting) value in return. Be nice. Be genuine. Your relationships with them will improve, and your social network will naturally begin to grow.
[Ed. Note: Brendan Florez is founder and CEO of Social Charm, LLC (www.SocialCharm.net), a company that uses analytical methods to understand and train people in the science of human interaction. Brendan graduated from Princeton University with a degree in electrical engineering, focusing on integrating engineering, neuroscience, and psychology.
Unsure where to find the types of connectors that can help build your social network? Meet dozens of new contacts - including some of the top wealth-building experts in their fields - at ETR's Profits in Paradise Wealth Summit this April. Get the details here.]
Worth Quoting: Ben Stein on Protecting Your Finances
“I have been pondering what advice to give [my children and friends] about money. What I keep coming up with is this: Do not act like typical Americans. Do not fail to save. Do not get yourself in debt up to your eyeballs. Work and take pride and honor from your work. Learn a useful skill that Americans really need, like law or plumbing or medicine or nursing. Do not expect your old Ma and Pa to always be there to take care of you. I absolutely guarantee that we will not be. Learn to be self-sufficient through your own contributions, as the saying goes.”
(Source: NYTimes.com)
Keep Your Muscle, Keep Your Youth
By Al Sears, MD
Unless you do something to prevent it, you’ll lose muscle as you age. That makes you susceptible to a host of health problems, including fat gain, sexual dysfunction, and depression.
Here are two steps you can take to rebuild or maintain your muscle mass:
1. Eliminate Aerobics.
Research shows that low-exertion, long-duration aerobic exercise causes muscle loss and actually shrinks your heart and lungs. Instead, your exercise routine should include short bursts of high-intensity exercise with gradually changing intervals over time. It’s the most effective way to burn fat and get a ripped body with functional strength.
2. Take Muscle-Supporting Nutrients.
You can also take nutrients daily to build and maintain muscle. Some of the best include:
• Protein (as the main focus of every meal). Your body needs protein to maintain your muscles and support new muscle growth. Throw away carb-heavy snacks and snack on boiled eggs and nuts instead.
• Creatine (5 mg a day). Creatine increases speed, performance, endurance, and strength. It increases the amount of muscle you build during resistance training.
• L-Arginine (500-1,000 mg a day). L-arginine is an essential amino acid that builds strength and muscle mass. I’ve used it for 20 years.
• Carnosine (500 mg a day). Made from two amino acids, carnosine helps protect the integrity of your muscles and make sure new muscle will be healthy and last.
• Glutamine (5 g a day as a powder in a shake). This amino acid helps stabilize energy levels and boost the production of natural growth hormone in your body. That tells your body to shed fat and build muscle. It also helps prevent muscle breakdown.
[Ed. Note: Dr. Sears is a practicing physician and the author of the patented PACE program. He is also a nutritional expert, a fitness expert, and is board certified by the American Board of Anti-Aging Medicine. The PACE program proves, once and for all, that a great body and vibrant health does NOT have to be difficult, time-consuming, or boring. Click HERE to read the full story.
For more expert recommendations on how to feel better and live longer, check out ETR's FREE natural health newsletter.]
It’s Good to Know: Is That Ad Watching You?
A new generation of ads uses software and a camera-tracking system to personalize messages displayed on video screens in malls, health clubs, and grocery stores. It is being tested in several places across the country, and marketing experts expect it to be a rising trend in the next several years.
A camera embedded in the screen scans the face of the person standing in front of it, determines his or her approximate age, gender, and even ethnicity, then serves up appropriate ads. So far, the technology is about 90 percent accurate when it comes to determining gender, but they are still working out kinks on the rest.
(Source: Associated Press)
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Word to the Wise: Esurient
“Esurient” (ih-SUR-ee-unt) – from the Latin for “to eat” – means “hungry/greedy.”
Example (as used by Michael Coren in the Alberta Report): “These new censors [of literature], the deconstructionists, take the most luscious and delicious apple and show it to a hungry person. They then seal the fruit with plastic wrap and demand that the esurient victim enjoy its flavour.”
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker ... build your self-confidence and intellect ... increase your attractiveness to others ... just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR's new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2009
I think this is a great article relating to how the physical and non-physical (tangible and intangible) — when combined — can influence and push anyone into making or losing a sale. Customers like to have everything and to experience anything. Most people reach out to customers with something tangible or physical–such as an advertisement or brochure, but by reaching into the non-physical, by giving them information that they can use forever or something they can learn, or even just by having a pleasurable experience in a business showroom, the customer is receiving something intangible as well. Tangible plus intangible = sale. =)
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