In this presentation, Desirae aims to help business owners create messaging for their own company and teach them how to simplify it.

 Build A Better Brand Messaging

Desirae Haluk owns Clairant Services, a Marketing Agency in New Jersey helping small businesses that rely solely on word of mouth and referrals to build a solid marketing foundation so that they have a more reliable growth method.

Desirae shared that in the last little while they have restructured their brand. And one of the reasons why she decided to do that is because she read one of her friend's books, Muting the Megaphone. Kate DiLeo, Desirae’s friend who wrote the book also runs a Branding Agency.

“I had no clue what I was getting myself into when I opened the book because it was called, Muting the Megaphone but it was this amazing walkthrough creating messaging for your brand, the proper way to do it, and the simplified way to do it.”

Let's face it, we all have competitors, but why are you different?

These exercises hopefully will bring some clarity into your brand and what you offer. It might even cause you to reposition yourself by either choosing a niche or just really identifying what makes you stand out.

Step 1: Create Your Tagline

“Just do it” is Nike’s tagline. But that does that tell us what Nike does. Absolutely not. However, a brand like Nike is big enough that they can use any tagline and everyone will still be able to memorize it because they have billions of dollars in their marketing budgets. For small business owners, we don't have that.

Therefore, an effective tagline is one that actually says, this is what I do.

“When I started this exercise, I thought my business tagline was “Startup Marketing. Simplified.”. And so what does that tell you? It tells you that I work with startups, it tells you that I do marketing and it tells you that I simplify it. However, I still didn't feel like that tagline really represented what we do because [in fact] we don't always work with startups. Also, it's not always simplified. We always do marketing so that was the one thing that we got right.”

Clairant Services' Old Tagline

Clairant Services' New Tagline

From “Startup Marketing. Simplified.”, Desirae came up with a new tagline that represents her brand better which is “Building Solid Marketing Foundations”. Moreover, Desirae uses the honey bee as her company logo and part of that is because honey bees build the honeycomb before they fill it with honey. That is what Desirae teaches her clients to do. One must build a solid foundation before  starting to build on top of it. 

Your solid foundation would include your brand and your messaging, a pillar that you need to get built before you start doing anything else.

Your tagline should be short, around five to six words at maximum. The least amount of words the better, but it should speak directly about what you do. 

Step 2: Create A Value Proposition Statement

This is how you solve your customer’s problem. What value are you bringing your prospects?

First, you need to do some research into who your target audience really is. Answer this question: who are you looking for that could use your products or services?

Second, make sure you write it down. Write a description of who your target audience is. Remember, it's more than just age and gender. It's about their behavior, where they hang out, what they do for a living, and how much money they make. Are they parents? Are they teenagers? What do they like to do and what keeps them up at night?

When you can understand what their pain points are, then you can create a message that will solve those pain points. It will allow them to sleep at night because you are the solution to their problems. 

Third, start with the pain statement. You need to highlight the problem. This is the first part of your value proposition statement.

Fourth, think of the best call to action statement. This is the second part of your value proposition statement.

For Desirae’s brand, here is how she did it.

The Problem

Many companies solely rely on word of mouth or referrals to grow their brands. This is her customer’s pain point. Relying on word of mouth or referrals is a problem because it's not consistent. 

The Value Proposition Statement

(Pain Statement) Relying on word of mouth or referrals is not an effective growth plan because it's unreliable and will not bring in enough revenue to grow at a steady rate.

(Target Audience) We specialize in the legal, financial, and coaching industries.

(Call To Action) Businesses need revenue to grow, and the only way to grow is with a marketing plan that will promote your brand effectively and bring in new customers. To solve this, you need to create a superior marketing foundation (bringing in the new tagline). With quality leadership and content that speaks to your specific target audience on the right channels.

It has two parts, it has the pain statement of what they're going through that keeps them up at night, and then it has the solution to that problem and how I bring that to them.

Creating a Value Proposition Statement is incredibly effective. This is the first thing people should see when they go to your website, when they read your boilerplate, and when they go on your social media platforms. 

 

Step 3: List Down Your Set of Differentiators

What makes you stand out from your competitors?

This can be tough in certain industries when your products are exactly the same as others. For example, in the Propane and Oil industry and all the competitors have the exact same oil and propane. It doesn't matter where it's made, it all comes from the ground and at the end of the day, it's all the same.

How do you differentiate yourself? Is that through customer service? Is that through guarantees? Is that through fast delivery? Is that through 24-hour service? These are things that you want to pull out that say, “hey, I am not like that competitor over there because I do this and this”.

For Desirae’s brand, their differentiators are the following:

• We specialize in the legal, financial, and coaching industries.
• We are accommodating and flexible.
• We are also accessible.
• We have USA-based employees.
• We are dedicated to quality over quantity.
• We are cost-effective, but we are not cheap.

“A lot of times you'll hire an agency and you cannot get ahold of them. You are like, where were you all week? What have you been doing? So we communicate, we're flexible, we're accommodating, we are fun and adventurous, and we're playful, but we're focused.”

The Tagline, Value Proposition Statement, and Set of Differentiators are the things that you want to think about for your own company. 

• When somebody lands on your website, make sure they will see your tagline so they will know right away what you do.
• Include your value proposition statement by identifying their pain points. Present your call to action statement and how you can solve their problems. 
• List down your set of differentiators and make your brand stand out.

If you want to bring clarity to your branding and your messaging, start with Step 1 today!