This is who you want to be along the customer journey. Hint: it’s not the hero.
Exceptional Marketing sets us apart. Exceptional storytelling sets us apart. Exceptional Offers with stacked bonuses set us apart. Exceptional training sets us apart.
Commitment and consistency set us apart. Creating the Know, Like, and Trust (KLT)-factor sets us apart. Generosity sets us apart. The Exceptional Role Model mindset sets us apart. Guiding your customer through the Aspirational Transformation sets us apart. Exceptional Insights set us apart. Exceptional Innovation and Problem-Solving set us apart.
But wait! A warning!
*Warning*: This Exceptionalism journey isn’t for everyone! Not everyone is willing to put in the work. Not everyone is willing to think beyond their current knowledge and beliefs. Not everyone thinks this will work for them. Not everyone can get out of their own heads for awhile and take a stroll in their prospects’ shoes. Not everyone gives themselves the gifts of Empathy & Authority.
No, this is not for everyone. It is only for those with the correct knowledge, beliefs and professional experiences to go and get after it for themselves and their families and their companies. You know, like someone hungry working in sales. Someone like that. Someone who believes in herself and in her ability to figure things out. Someone who is street & market savvy. Someone who attacks problems from multiple angles. Someone who is tenacious. Someone who keeps going. Someone who doesn’t stop. It takes a particular style of person. No, this is not for everyone.
Exceptional Marketing is marketing so good that people would be willing to pay for it.
This is marketing all about them.
Nobody cares about you in your marketing or sales actions. Nope. They don’t.
They care about themselves and what’s in it for them.
Great marketing starts with customer problems and then offers solutions, such as training, education, cheat sheets, Hey-we’ll-do-this-for-you (DFY) solutions, Great marketing tells stories of transformation, of customer success. (See Salesforce. See StoryBrand.) Great marketing wins over and over and over again. Great marketing is like a machine, a bot, AI, consistently and predictably putting cool things in front of the right people and then moving them along the customer journey. People will pay up for a transformation. IN fact, this is one of your Chief differentiations.
We need to think hard on our differentiation because what if you sell something that the other guy sells? What if you market and sell — Gasp! — a commodity!? What then!? Whatever will we do? Well, we’ll need to think hard about this situation and strategize how we decommoditize it.
People as Differentiators.
What helps separate great brands from another competitor? Great marketing and salesmanship! Yes! It is the stories that they tell through their web site, their social presences, through their packaging, through their videos and Zooms, through their offers that help separate them. Also, the personalities they employ are differentiators, too, since different people resonate with others. People are differentiators!? Yes, they are.
It turns out, you’re also a behavior designer!
In sales differentiation, you’re a behavior designer, too. What happens when the customer buys and then goes, “Now, what do I do!?”
Your company’s go-to-market is a differentiation force as well because different firms have different methods and tactics they use during the customer journey. You may offer training, cheat sheets, one-on-one Zooms and professional services through customer success people as you onboard your customers. All these are wonderful points of difference because so often we buy and then we go, “Now, what do I do?”
These customer onboarding processes are really important in order to decrease customer churn rate, like for SAAS companies. We want our customers using our product as much as possible. In fact, we want our product to become habit. So, in a sense, we are behavior designers! You are. I am. Anyone dedicated to creativity, ferocity, to making their difference though their points of difference is a behavior designer. This is a powerful role. Use it wisely.
