The Power of Branding

Positioning yourself and your company – EXTREMELY important to your success!!  What sets you apart from your competitors?  You may know who you are and what you do, but do your customers and clients?  Are you communicating the right message about “YOU”?

An article in Bloomberg Business Week, states it aptly:  “Positioning is the process of distinguishing yourself from competitors in specific ways in order to be the preferred provider for certain market segments. It’s the act of designing your company’s offer and image so it occupies a distinct and valued place in the targeted customer’s mind.” 

I could go on forever about this topic because it’s what I do for clients!  If I am going to work with a company, I must determine what is exclusively compelling about their business that would encourage people to do business with them rather than their competitors.  I see a clear correlation between positioning and branding.

I will share some of my methods for helping clients to clarify their unique value proposition when positioning themselves. And what is a value proposition?  It is the #1 reason that people would want to do business with you.

  • Delve into services/products offered by talking to the management team members individually.  Are they all singing from the same page?  If not, why not?
  • If there is inconsistency in the message, hone in on it.  Define the issues and realign the team.
  • When appropriate, consider querying current clients to discover what redeeming qualities they perceive in the services received.
  • If evaluating the feasibility of expanding or adding new services/products, organize a steering committee, with participants from outside and within, for guidance and direction.

Here’s a challenge for a few “tough” competitive businesses that must be extremely diligent in positioning themselves.  You can have fun with this, but try applying it to your specific company and industry sector.

  • CPA Firm – “We specialize in tax and audit work.”  My reply:  “Don’t all CPA firms do that?
  • Bank – “We provide banking services for our customers.”  My reply:  “So, what do your competitors do?”
  • Law Firm – “We help our clients with their legal matters or issues.”  My reply:  “There are a lot of other lawyers out there who claim to do the same thing!”
  • Financial Planner – “We help our clients plan for a more secure future.”  My reply:  “I’ve heard that a million times!”

Do you get the picture?… There are a lot of people I know who have done a great job in positioning themselves and their businesses, but I’ve selected two individuals who are exceptional in what they have done.

  • Morris Miller, CEO of Xenex Healthcare Services – Here is a fine example of an entrepreneur extraordinaire.  Morris was co-founder of Rackspace Managed Hosting where he served as President/CEO.  In 2009 Morris came across a tiny start-up company in Austin that he knew had a future in the healthcare industry.  Morris has moved the headquarters to San Antonio and is well into positioning Xenex as the breakthrough solution for dramatically reducing the number of infections contracted in hospitals by decontaminating and sterilizing the patient care environments.  I’ve personally met Erwin, the robot, who rolls around zapping germs!  Very nice fella!!  Try googling Xenex and see what happens.  You will surely be impressed.
  • Christy Prescott, CEO and founder of Corporate Travel Planners – CTP is one of the largest women-owned full service travel management companies in Texas and among the top 50 in the country.  She started her company in 1991 with one location, and now CTP, through its affiliation with Travel Leaders, has become a unique mix of local and global reach doing in excess of $7-billion from a network of 461 locations throughout the U.S.  Christy is in an extremely competitive business with margins from sales plummeting to almost nothing.  It took strategic repositioning and branding in order to compete with the big boys in the industry.  And now she is one of them!  But what sets Christy apart is her humanitarian initiatives.  For example, her foundation, Christy’s Hope, donated this past year over $200,000 to the Battered Women and Children’s Center!

I’m sure you can name other incredible companies that seem to have done all the right things in moving forward.  Perhaps your own company is on that list!