How to Craft Strong Messaging that Resonates with Potential Customers

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Even in this digital age of A/B testing and validated learning, a majority of businesses suffer from marketing messaging that fall flat. What starts as a seemingly brilliant campaign ends up leading to zero return. When consistency is what makes or breaks a brand, can your business afford to keep changing its messaging until it happens upon what works? The answer is no. You don’t have time to waste on ineffective campaigns when 49% of consumers will ignore your ads if the messaging isn’t relevant to them.


Messaging Mantra #1
Never market without knowing if your message resonates with prospects.


Strategic Messaging Means Talking Directly to Your Customer
On the flip side, more than a third of customers are likely to buy from a business that delivers tailored messages. The key to these magic messages is simple: listen to your customer. Your ideal customer has the insight to show you exactly how your brand resonates with potential customers. From all of the options, they chose you and they had a good reason why.

Most brands feel that focus groups are the best way to discover the voice of the customer. Unfortunately, they aren’t. The dynamic of focus groups will have your customers worried more about how they look and sound in front of their peers, as opposed to expressing their true opinions.


Messaging Mantra #2
Use anonymous phone interviews to talk directly to your customer.


Incorporate Your Strengths
Talking with your customer reveals what potential clients will value in your business. The next step is to combine that with what your organization excels at. If you’re not the cheapest amongst your competitors, then don’t try and position yourself around price. Ask yourself, what are we the best at? Positioning your business based on your unique strengths sets you apart from the competition.


Messaging Mantra #3
Leverage your strengths, dummy.


Capitalize on the Competitor’s Weaknesses
Similarly, great messaging makes the competitor’s shortfallings apparent. If your competitors – and by competition we mean any alternative that the customer has – have a weakness that you can exploit, do it!

Often, we find clients scratching their heads when it comes to identifying their own strengths and the weaknesses of their competitors. Again, here is the value of listening to your customer. Often times, what organizations think of as routine operations may in fact be a differentiator. We recently worked with a property management firm that operates in the competitive DC market. They were flabbergasted when they found out that their customers, above all, valued their high level of responsiveness. “But that’s just how we do things though,” their VP said to us. Apparently, it wasn’t how the competition was doing business and this idea ended up being the cornerstone of their Sales Moment.


Messaging Mantra #4
Convey the downside of not choosing you.


At the Center: Your Sales Moment
When you listen to your customer, focus on your own strategic advantages, and capitalize on the competitor’s weaknesses, something amazing happens. You arrive at your Sales Moment. This is the single idea that tilts sales in your favor. To cut through the chaos and clutter that we’re constantly bombarded with, the only way to efficiently market is by boiling your message down into one idea. Your campaigns may change, but this idea should be at the core of all marketing messages.


Messaging Mantra #5
Boil it down to one idea that tilts sales in your favor.


The Perfection of Marketing
The idea of finding the Sales Moment was established by James Conner, in his book The Perfection of Marketing. Distilling your customer desires, unique strengths, and the competition’s weaknesses into a single idea creates a basis for marketing messages that resonate with prospects. With focus and discipline, positioning your brand through the sales moment generates wins, increases revenue, and amplifies brand awareness.