The Millionaire Fastlane

by MJ DeMarco

  [43] - Build Brands, Not Businesses

  Everyone has an invisible sign hanging from their neck saying,‘Make me feel important.’ Never forget that message when working with people.

  ~ Mary Kay Ash

  Queen Me: Marketing and Branding

  In chess, lose your queen you lose the game. In business, most entrepreneurs play the game without their captured queen.

  Have you ever bought a product from television, and when you used it, it sucked and didn’t perform as advertised? Then, in dissatisfaction, you tried to return it and got the runaround from a guy who sounded like he had a double-digit IQ? That is the power of marketing: bad people, bad service, and bad product, but AWESOME MARKETING.

  If you have an OK product (a weak knight), poor customer service (drunk bishops), and incompetent people (a castle full of idiots), you can survive with a powerful queen.

  The queen is the most powerful piece in chess and it is also in business. Marketing can convince people to buy mediocre products. Marketing can hide or disguise service flaws. It can shadow incompetence, and it can keep convicted felons disparate from their product. The power of marketing is that an effective ad campaign can move products, regardless of the cockroaches hiding underneath. Marketing is a game of perceptions, and whatever the perception is, that’s the reality.

  Build a Brand, Not a Business

  Businesses survive. Brands thrive. A brand is the best defense to commoditization. When your business just pays the bills for the month, you’re playing checkers and being one-dimensional. People are loyal to brands and relationships, not corporations or businesses.

  When you think about a Volvo, what do you think of? I think safety. Porsche? I think speed. How about Ferrari? Rich. Volkswagen? Practical… which then mutated untrustworthy with their 2015 diesel technology scandal. Toyota? Reliability. Yet, when someone mentions Chevrolet, nothing clear comes to mind other than bankruptcy, union squabbles, and unpredictable reliability. Some auto manufacturers have carved out strong brands, while the others fortify a business.

  Our friend with the carpet-cleaning business also has a business and not a brand. Brands don’t have identity crises, businesses do. If our friend wants to excel in an industry saturated with me-toos, he’s going to have to brand and differentiate himself. He needs to be a Lamborghini in a traffic jam of Chevys. What will make his carpet cleaning business different from the rest? Why should people hire him even though his prices might be 20% higher?

  These tough questions have tough answers, especially since his entry into the industry was based on a faulty premise. However, upon further investigation, most of his unscrupulous competitors use bait-and-switch advertising tactics gummed down with fine print. Perhaps this industry weakness is exploitable? My challenge to him was to leverage that nuisance. Perhaps he can brand himself as a “no-nonsense” carpet cleaner—fixed prices, no surcharges, and no fine print.

  Apple, the computer maker, is a great example of building a brand based on a need, or a nuisance. People hate viruses, spyware, and the constant “Your updates are ready” messages that are associated with PC computers. Apple exploited PC’s weaknesses and solved their problems. It has built itself into one of the most successful brands in history. Apple isn’t the cheapest because they’ve engineered a brand and they can demand a higher price. Say “Apple,” and many images come to mind: creative, trendy, easy, and hip. When I think of PC, I think of blue screens, illegal operations, and “you must reboot your computer 17 times before this update takes effect.” One is a business. The other is a brand.

  Get Unique: The USP

  The first step at building a brand is to have a Unique Selling Proposition or a USP. As a business without one, you’re adrift in a sea of me-too businesses without a rudder, unmoored to the tradewinds of the marketplace. USP-less businesses offer nothing distinct or unique, no benefit or logical reasons why someone should buy other than hope or circumstance wrapped around a cheap price.

  Your USP is your brand anchor and is typically your lead value skew.

  What makes your company different from the rest?

  What will compel a customer to buy from you over someone else?

  My USP was powerful: “No-risk advertising: If we send you nothing, you pay nothing.”

  Advertisers joined by the truckload because they were tired of expensive advertising options which offered this risk proposition: “Pay us $5,000 upfront, then hope and pray.” I exposed a pain-point, fixed it, and then advertised it.

  Our carpet cleaner had no USP. Nothing set him apart, as he might as well just been a lonely grain of rice in a 50-pound bag of feed.

  USPs are the building blocks to brands and can compensate for higher prices or even an inferior product. FedEx was introduced to the world when it said, “When your package absolutely positively has to be there overnight.” M&M’s said, “The milk chocolate melts in your mouth, not in your hand.”

  Notice how these USPs target benefits. I don’t like Domino’s Pizza (despite once being employed by them), and yet that didn’t stop them from building a pizza empire based on the USP of “delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less—or it’s free.” Domino’s identified the need: Pizza delivery was a long ordeal. They solved it, branded it, and the rest is history. More recently, Dominos became the first major fast pizza chain to offer vegan cheese as an option. This uniqueness broadens their market to a swath of new consumers who never before considered the chain.

  Developing Your USP

  How do you develop a solid USP for your company? There are five steps.

  Step 1: Uncover the Benefit(s)

  Get into business for the right reason: to add or create value, solve problems or fill a need. That creates your first USP. If you are already in business, find your greatest product benefit, one that sets it apart from the competition. If you don’t have a distinct benefit that’s obvious to your potential buyer, you’re operating without a USP.

  Step 2: Be Unique

  The objective of a USP is to be unique when compared to the alternatives. This plants a logical argument into your customer for choosing your company, because, without your company, they are forgoing the benefit.

  USPs should use powerful action verbs that create desire and urgency.

  “Lose weight” should be changed to “Obliterate fat” or “Shred pounds.”

  “Grow your business” should be dropped in favor of “Explode revenues” or “Shatter sales records.”

  The your USP’s uniqueness creates a consumer divergence when it comes to their buying decision. If you pick a Mac over a PC, you are choosing safety, speed, and reliability over viruses and bloatware.

  Step 3: Be Specific and Give Evidence

  Noise is everywhere, and if you are going to rise above it, you have to alleviate natural consumer skepticism. Do so by being specific, and if possible, offer evidence.

  WEB SITE:“Your car sold in 20 days or less or it’s free.”

  PRODUCT:“Drop 20 pounds or you don’t pay a dime.”

  SERVICE:“Your home sold in 30 days or I own it.”

  Domino’s Pizza didn’t say “Delivered on time,” they said, “Delivered within 30 minutes or it’s free.” It was a specific action and evidence of that action. (Your pizza is free if we don’t perform!) In my case, the onus was on me to send my advertisers leads. If I didn’t, I didn’t get paid. “We send you business or you don’t pay a dime.”

  Step 4: Keep it Short, Clear, and Concise

  The best USPs are short, clear, and powerful. Long phrases get skipped over.

  Step 5: Integrate Your USP into ALL Marketing Materials

  A USP is worthless if it isn’t conveyed throughout every aspect of your business. Include your USP on all your public communications:

  ✓Your trucks, vehicles, and buildings

  ✓Your advertising, promotional materials, and social media accounts

  ✓Business cards, letterheads, signs, brochures, and flyers
<
br />   ✓Your website and your email signature

  ✓Your voice mail system, receptionist/sales scripts, etc.

  Step 6: Make It Real

  A USP has to be convincing, enough so that people buy or, even better, switch brands. If it doesn’t capture your audience’s attention, or the benefit/hook is too weak, it won’t work. And then make your USP real. You must deliver on what you say. A pizza delivered in 40 minutes makes the 30-minute guarantee a fraud. Fraudulent USPs get exposed and create “human resource systems” ready to rick-roll your company on social media.

  Get Noisy

  Next time you’re stuck in traffic, look around. Every car looks the same. Nothing commands any significant attention. It’s a sea of sameness. Born a marketer, this is why outrageous cars not found at every street light intrigue me. They rise above the noise, and optimally, we’d like our brand to do the same.

  Face it. We seek to be different. Unique. The average teenager strives for uniqueness, which is why we have nipple rings, eye piercings, Goth, and tattoos—all expressions of “I’m different!”

  Successful companies take the same approach with their branding and marketing.

  Writing this book, while challenging, wasn’t the real challenge. Getting it into the hands of people will be the real challenge. Why? Because the topic of finance and moneymaking is crowded and saturated with me-toos. In other words, the noise is deafening. While this book is the realization of my dream, to succeed as a best-selling author I need to get my brand above the noise.

  One look on YouTube and all I see is noise.

  College dropout earns $2,000 in one day trading penny stocks. Find out how!

  See how I make $15,000 a month with this crypto blockchain opportunity!

  New startup with a forced-matrix plan guarantees six-figure income!

  I just joined this awesome affiliate program and made $300 today!

  I recently used an Internet calculator that tabulated my “wealth percentile,” which ranked my net worth in comparison to all of my peers in the United States. I was ranked in the top .05%. While I’m flattered, it exposes my challenge. My net worth is indicative of “unique” and “extraordinary” but in the world of perception, it’s lost in the noise. On Instagram, you’d never guess that everyone is near broke. Nope, everyone is a multimillionaire, a success coach, a guru, or a model. Everyone is in the top 1% of his or her game, including the real top 1%. You see, we all are marketers and some of us are marketers of an illusion. What this does is creates an abundance of noise and makes it harder for the real value-providers to be heard. Your marketing efforts must rise above the noise.

  How to Rise above the Noise

  There are five ways to get your message above the noise:

  (1)Polarize

  (2)Be risqué

  (3)Arouse emotion

  (4)Be interactive / use open loops

  (5)Be unconventional

  Polarize

  Polarization probably isn’t the best business strategy for a mass-market brand, because polarization involves extreme viewpoints or messages. You don’t want to piss off half your customer base! However, polarization works fabulously for websites in need of traffic or books in need of readers.

  Polarization works because it involves an extreme viewpoint, which forces people to either love or hate you. Donald Trump is polarizing. You either love him or want to toss him off a boat in the alligator-infested Everglades. Political pundits use polarization to sell books, because readers want to rally for a cause, or furiously refute it. websites that polarize attract visitors as people defend their cause while others attack it. If you’re a rabid Yankees fan and start a website that viciously attacks the ineptness of the Mets, you can expect a polarized audience—people who agree and concur and people who oppose and defend.

  This book itself can be classified as polarizing. Many people will castigate my viewpoints as extreme since it goes against conventional wisdom. OMG he said the cutting coupons won’t make me rich! He castigated my 401(k) Opposition to “normal” will always be considered polarizing.

  Be Risqué

  Sex sells, and it is the most used get-above-the-noise technique. Sex is a powerful noise disruptor because sex never goes out of style. You can overuse it, but people will always respond to it. In 2005, GoDaddy aired its first Super Bowl ad by using sex as weapon to get above the noise. The now-infamous GoDaddy Girl ads followed in subsequent years. I never thought the ads were that good, yet they got above the noise and got people’s attention. The result? Increased sales and GoDaddy’s market share surged to 32% after 2006.

  Social media marketers use the risqué technique on Facebook and YouTube with glaring obviousness. Ever notice YouTube videos with sexual thumbnails always have ten times the views? In another case, one woman does video lectures on marketing techniques in her bikini. When she does, her bikini video receives five times the viewership and comments. Why do the bikini lectures do better than the normal ones? Simple: Sex gets above the noise. Men see the woman’s busty chest in the video preview and think, “Oooh, I gotta check that out,” while women are curious—“OMG, who is doing a video in a bikini top?” It’s almost a mix of polarization and sex.

  But be careful: leveraging sex as an attention grabber can also tarnish your brand if it isn’t tasteful or within a reasonable spectrum of cultural sensitivity. “Great message” and “tacky” is in the eye of the beholder. And no, I won’t be doing shirtless videos anytime soon. :-)

  Arouse Emotion

  Most consumer buying decisions are driven by emotions. You and I buy stuff because we want to feel something. I don’t buy a Lamborghini to go from point A to point B; that’s practicality. I buy to feel something—pride, achievement, uniqueness, adrenaline, and fame.

  Another example of using emotions to move your audience comes from the nonprofit organization the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty for Animals (ASPCA.org). This organization was founded over a century ago and I had never heard of it until recently. How did they break above the noise? They launched a powerful marketing campaign that unleashed emotions; their commercials featured caged, abused animals combined with a tender, heartfelt soundtrack.

  If you can move your audience’s emotions and make them care, they will buy. Exhilarate people, make them cry and make them laugh. Your message will rise from the ashes of noise and compel buyers.

  Be Interactive

  It’s one thing to watch, it’s another to do it. They say if you want to boil your passions, test drive the car of your dreams. Interactivity increases response for anything. If you can taste it, feel it, or use it, you will be more likely to buy it.

  Interaction is like hearing your name. It’s your favorite. On Facebook, the most popular applications are “surveys” and “questionnaires” because people love narcissism. My favorite movie is The Usual Suspects! I love pizza! I own a poodle! People love to talk about themselves, and if you entwine that into your marketing plan, you will improve the response to your product or service.

  For example, if I launch a survey “Are you speeding the Fastlane or stuck in the Slowlane? Find out now.” I am using an interactive campaign designed to involve people and get them to talk about themselves. When your potential customers break down their personal barriers and expose pieces of themselves, a relationship builds making it easier to sell. A relationship sells more than an anonymous corporate entity.

  “Find out what happens next . . .” Some corporations are using traditional media and the Internet to foster interaction. I recently saw a commercial for an automobile manufacturer that filmed a story with a high-speed chase, except the story never concludes and we are left with “Find out what happens next . . . visit [website].” By teasing audiences with incomplete messages or stories, potential customers are left with an open loop that needs closing. They visit the website seeking closure.

  The revolution of social media, blogs, and “Web 2.0” is founded on interaction. You just don’t w
ant to read an article; you want to comment on it! Your two cents must be heard!

  And finally, video gaming and the “freemium” business model is another example of interaction. When you download a free video game and get addicted to its gameplay, you’re more likely to “upgrade” and pay for the premium features.

  Be Unconventional

  Convention breeds familiarity. If you’ve seen it three dozen times in the last month, do you think it will work? For example, “Be your own boss” is such an overused phrase its power has been neutered. Yet, I still see advertising from so-called gurus using “Be your own boss,” as if the phrase wielded power. Its been pulverized into flaccidity, so why the heck are you using it?

  What’s unconventional? Have you ever seen a Lamborghini sold for a dollar? I haven’t and if I did, I’d remember. The campaign would arouse curiosity because it’s unconventional. What crazy person would sell an exotic car for a buck? Is it a scam? What’s the catch? I’ve got to see!

  Another example of unconventional is to break convention by mocking it, or interrupting it. Remember the Energizer bunny? It’s still going and going. These commercials built a brand based on unconvention—the advertiser created a series of standard, boring marketing messages and shattered them with sudden interruptions of the Energizer bunny. The marketer anticipated your familiarity with convention (ugh, another boring commercial) and shocked the audience by interrupting that boredom with a pink rabbit. AdAge.com recognized these commercials as one of the top 100 campaigns of all time.