Have you been trying super hard to get your brand noticed and it’s still not working? Feel like maybe a frustrated because your not sure how you can standout from the crowd? I’ll be providing you with three secret top tips in how you can get your brand to standing out from other competitors. So your ideal customers and clients start noticing you and buying from you. Complete swamped right now? Listen on the go! Whether your walking on foot, sitting on train, or cruising in a car – episode 012 on >>Apple Podcast<< or >>Spotify<<
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Thank you, Olivia x
The importance of standing out and not fitting in!
Time 00:28
So why is standing out from the competitors important. The simple reason is that we want to be seen, and we want our customers to choose us over another brand. Therefore standing out gives us the upper hand, it helps our brand be noticed. There are many ways in which a brand can standout, most people think that the design is the main way to standout. It definitely has it’s advantages but as we can see today specially in the small business world a lot of brand design identities are looking very similar. So in order to standout we must also look at other tools under your brand umbrella and you do have other impressionable touch-points that can help.
Be Different Think Different
Time 01:09
To standout, you got to start thinking and doing things differently from other businesses. To do this we must look at other small businesses, so put on your Sherlock Holmes hat and really start detecting the gaps, problems and even frustrations customers are having. Problems may even arise due to the services offered etc. Market research will help you discover these golden nuggets of problems customers are having and dealing with but no one is really talking it.
For example a virtual assistant business might have a range of options for customers to choose from, one service options might be a 2 hour or less per a month the other might be up to 5 hours plus a month. You have the usual process of a client form and then consultation which can take up to 7 days till actually booked in with you. What about the business owners who don’t have 7 days to get help? What if there are business owners who need help right now in the hour?! The business owner who have a cruises and they just need that second pair of hands today? We’ve been there when we’ve lost a piece of work or double booked ourselves etc. We all make mistakes from time to time, so what if someone could fill the void and offer 5 days a week Emergency Virtual Assistant care? No consultation just payment up front a call or form discussing what they need. I bet this would really fill a gap in the virtual assistant business model. That’s a brand thinking differently!
Niche Down To Standout
Time 02:59
It’s true what they say if you’re talking to everyone, you’re not talking to anyone. When you want to standout you need to know who it is you’re talking too. One main reason we create and publish content is to build a connection with our audience online. But content shouldn’t be generalised or adding to the noise. You content need to standout! This is where niche down can really help. Niching down can sound scary to business owners, the concept can almost feel like your shutting the door on a whole group of possible customers. But that is far from the truth, niching down means you create a whole new door a more customised door. That old door had a plaque stating very generally what you offer and who for example it would say I’m a Copy writer for online businesses. But the niched down door is customise with a plaque saying what you do and the ideal person you want to help I’m a Content Writer for Female Empowered Businesses or For ethically friends brand you get the jest! Now I’m no expert but if I had a toss up between these two door, generally specking if the customise door fits you’ll always choose that over the general.
Customising your content to your niche audience, will help you forge a much fast connections and trust. If you need a math tutor would you pick one that just teaches maths or the tutor that teach maths, English and Science? You would pick the tutor who solely teaches maths, because we the other tutor skills and expertise are divided across three subject, where as just the maths tutorial we naturally think they will have a deeper understanding of maths because his time isn’t divided it dedicated to just the topic of maths. If you have the chance or opportunity get niching, you’ll standout more.
Surprise & delight your ideal audience
Time 05:03
One of the best ways to standout from you competitors is by beating your customers’ expectations through surprise and delight. To standout you should be always trying to go that extra mile where other competitors and businesses in your field don’t. To surprise and delight a customer doesn’t have to be an overwhelming action, even the simplest of things can make such a big impact on your customers. For example this could be sending them a gift to anyone who mention you on social media. If you host a podcast do a shout out at the end to whoever has mentioned your brand on social media or given you a nice review that week or followed you etc. But my favourite is hand written notes, not types not written than scanned a fresh hand written note. There something so personal about your hand writing to receive a hand written note is a lovely thing to receive specially now that no one ever writes to one another. But send a thank you note to appreciate there support is a delight to receive.
I read this online blog post about where’s your fortune cookie moments? And in it he explains that his wife bought a coat in the sale and the first outing she wore it she put her hands in the pockets and instead of pulling out a generic product number tag or something, it was a note saying “you are a goddess.” This made them immediately start to think about who actually made the coat… doing it job and stood out from the crowd I’ve never received a secret note in my pocket.
How could you include this concept if you’re not a coat maker? Well if you’re a candle maker it might be able to hide your fortune cookie notes in the wax? If you’re a service based business you’ll have to think of something else but you get the idea! Surprise and delight your customers wherever and whenever you can! Your customers will already have positive encounter with your brand and therefore more likely to remember you as well.
Become a standout brand
Time 07:06
It’s now time for you to stop fitting in and start standing out from the crowd! No excuses you’ve got three unique ways your brand can achieve this. To reiterate, you can standout from competitors by simple being different by thinking differently, offering different services etc. Niching your brand down so you can customise and speak more deeply to your ideal audience. Plus not to mention the surprise and delight factor, we all like to be treated from time to time so make sure your doing the same for your customers and or potential customers. Obviously your brand identity needs to standout. These three tips will give you some motivation and inspiration to focus on standing out rather just trying to stay professional like others and not tip the boat. Being noticed is what you want and need, just make your becoming a standout brand for all the positive and good reasons.
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