Episode 71 // Messaging in marketing: how do I know what to say?

​Speaker 1 (00:00.456)
You know, design’s really fun. But it also can be super distracting because there’s a lot of options. Content will get you down to those specifics a lot faster and will guide your ideas. You can write ideas far faster than you can draw them or concept them with visuals. Putting the content first in your process is really helpful.

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:24.674)
You’re listening to the Remarca Brand Podcast, where authentic brands win.

Speaker 1 (00:36.982)
Hey Sam, how are you man?

Hey Mike, it’s good to be here with you once again.

Yeah, once again on the Remarkable Brand podcast, we appreciate everybody listening in. Today, I’m really excited. We’re going to be focusing on kind of going back to something we’ve been talking about over the last, I don’t know, six months. Yeah. This is kind of like, how do you go to market? Now that you’ve got your brand, how do you go to market with it? And we’ve talked through, like, how do you find your audience? How do you get your team rallied around your new brand? Going all the way back, we talked, I think, in the first episode of this series about

how to utilize your brand anthem. And today we’re going to be talking about the message in your go-to-market strategy. What do you actually say to people? So that’s what we’ll be talking about. But first, let’s do a little improv.

Yeah, Mike, think today it’s only appropriate that we name 10 campaign slogans that never saw the light of

Speaker 1 (01:31.894)
Okay, 10 campaign slogans. I’m gonna have to remember the ones we did last time and not say them again.

Well, that’s, hey, anything goes. I’ll start. Campbell’s Soup, it’s super good.

got malc. I don’t know what that is, but I didn’t see the light. Yeah, I think so. Okay. think so.

It’s not like an anger management.

yeah,

Speaker 2 (02:04.194)
Doors. The doors. The doors. I don’t know. The doors. There’s just doors.

It’s like the band. It’s selling doors.

I was just looking at a door. I’m looking around the room. Alright, that’s three.

Build it and they will come. Construction company.

That’s good. That’s good. Also feel the dreams, right? Sure. But yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:28.046)
Well, we don’t need to say that out loud because then we’ll get like a cease and desist letter if we’re that company.

It’ll keep you from coffeeing. It’s like a throat lozenge coffee brand.

Yeah, just don’t put those two together. I swage my coffin with coffee. Yeah. There’s something there.

There’s something there. That’s five.

We always win, even when you lose. Law firm.

Speaker 2 (03:01.582)
I like that one. Yeah, I would totally do that The honest law we get paid no matter whether Yeah, that’s not that’s not making the light of day for sure Okay We’re we’re the road we’re the road people yay

A lot of truth in that one.

Speaker 1 (03:14.05)
You got paid or not.

Speaker 1 (03:30.357)
Construction company.

But it’s the yay that really gets you excited about it.

Man I just had one and then I lost it dang it. Killing you since 1855 cigarettes

wow, that’s a good one. Yeah, very, very, very in your face.

The key to this game is just think about what is true about products and just say it.

Speaker 2 (03:53.934)
That’s good. Yeah. Serving restrooms since 1923. Taco Bell.

I don’t know what number we’re on. All right. It actually does burn. Alcohol.

I think we got one more.

Speaker 2 (04:13.656)
That’s true on many levels, I feel like. You could use it for lighter fluid or to drink it.

Alright, well that was fun.

So we’re talking about all about what do I say? All right, so I’ve worked on my brand. I’ve got this great authentic identity. We’ve got a great brand anthem. So I think at some level, we’re starting to answer that question already with our brand anthem. And we’ve done some research. We kind of know our audience. We know who we’re trying to target. But how do we know exactly what to say to them? Like I think that’s oftentimes maybe the hardest question out of like the whole marketing plan.

that people were trying to put together, like, okay, how do I get to market? How do I go out with this new brand that we’ve created? What do we actually say to people? And how do we balance that? Because I think one of the nuances here is how do we balance that between the brand and wanting to be true and authentic to ourselves and wanting to use language that actually fits our audience, right? Things that they’re used to hearing.

Maybe we can start with like why is messaging important to begin with? What do you think Sam?

Speaker 2 (05:30.37)
I think messaging is actually everything in your marketing. It should inform your design. It should inform your layout. I think sometimes people get that backwards where they’re like, I saw this cool template. Let’s shoehorn a bunch of copy into this thing. Or, the competition just put that out. Can we just do that and we’ll come up with some? Yeah, just change a few words. I mean, I’ve heard that so often and it’s so sad.

You really should, I mean the foundation for any ad or marketing or anything you put on your website should be the message. What are you saying? What are you actually saying to people? Are you just putting stuff on a webpage just to fill something up or just to appease the SEO, you know, the optimization of that Google, you know, saying what Google wants you to say or are you actually saying something meaningful to the people that you want to look at and hear your message?

Yeah, like approach. and almost almost like a like how do you serve the people that are eventually you hope are going to see that message or hear that message or read that message? How do you get inside of their head and figure out like how do I speak to that person almost like somebody you know really well? Maybe it’s a spouse or a child or an uncle that you love

Content first

Speaker 2 (06:58.424)
And you just get that person, you know what they like, you know like, if I bring this up, they’re gonna like, we’re gonna have a great conversation about it.

If I bring that up, it’s gonna… Just kill it.

Yeah, or he’s walking away angry. So you really have to do a lot of upfront work. And we’ve talked about that a little bit already. But then you have to like kind of commit to speaking to the audience that you’ve committed to. Yeah. Because there is like, OK, we know like we’re trying to get in front of this type of person. But then you actually have to like commit and say like, OK, we’re going to actually do this. We’re not going to try to be everything to all people.

we’re actually gonna create this really focused message that serves this specific audience.

Yeah, and I think that’s where like we were talking before the show about being specific. Yeah. Right. And the more targeted, the more specific you can be with that message. So thinking through like, yeah, OK, going back to the last episode, knowing your audience like inside and out. Right. So being really specific to them, even beyond the industry, all the way down to like job title or core values that they hold or unique problems that they’re trying to solve with you.

Speaker 1 (08:11.668)
in mind, right? So it’s this kind of combination. This I think where it gets tricky, right? You’re trying to kind of layer this message that you have, this overall brand message, your brand anthem, with messaging that really resonates directly to the target person. I hate that word target, but that’s really what it is. You have a certain person in mind, maybe a persona you’ve developed, and you’re thinking about their context. You’re thinking about their problems. You’re thinking about their values.

You’re thinking about the challenges they’re encountering, the context around them, maybe just what does their work life look like or what does their personal life look like? And having all those things in mind when you start to address those problems. And then even using the brand anthem formula, right, you’ve used that kind of at a high level in the branding process, if you’ve kind of taken this process all the way through from things we’ve already outlined both in this series and then in lots of content.

past if you look at brand story you can find all sorts of stuff that we’ve written about that. Even in our book too there’s a whole chapter on that. But like that brand anthem right that brand story or anthem that you’ve created you used a template for that or kind of a formula there’s identifying who the hero is that’s your that’s your target right that’s your your client that you want to work with. Or in some cases that might even be you know thinking through like hey we’re bringing our brand to life and

in terms of attracting talent too. That’s the talent. That’s the hero. They have a specific problem. You’re uniquely suited to solve that. In this case, maybe narrowing in, right? So instead of like, the whole firm is uniquely suited because of these unique attributes of our firm, now we’re gonna self-select into like, a specific industry, maybe with a specific service for a specific role. Let’s start writing content that gets that specific.

So

Speaker 1 (10:08.472)
So starting to take your brand anthem and you’re still using all the pieces of it, right? We’re talking to the hero. Well, let’s be a little bit more specific than we were at the top level, brand level. Let’s get in really tight on a specific industry, a role, certain kinds of people within that. And then let’s talk about specific services or a specific service. I think the more you can get tight on that too, the better your messaging’s gonna be.

We’re gonna get into this more, but there’s even an aspect of like what’s your medium? Where are you at? Where are you putting this? Is it on your website? Is it an ad? Is it on LinkedIn? Is it on Google? Like where’s all this stuff living? The message probably needs to resonate with that a little bit. And so like all these factors play into the message that you need to have. But I really, fully, heartily, 100 % agree, content first. Don’t start designing stuff until you’ve written something.

And I would argue you will end up with far better advertising if you invest, let’s say you have a budget of hours, right? You have 10 hours to work on this ad. If you put six to eight into the content and you only leave yourself two hours for the design, I’d argue you’re gonna come out with a better ad than if you had put two hours into writing and eight hours into design.

or 10 minutes into chat GPT. Create an ad for me here. It’s true and I can kind of speak to that from a design standpoint. When a designer has really good content, good copy, clear copy, the design process is way easier. It absolutely does.

It kind of just comes together. It does.

Speaker 2 (11:51.182)
And that’s when, yeah, like you said, that’s when a good, whether it’s an ad or a landing page or whatever, that’s when the magic happens.

In an ideal world, and I think you look at big ad agencies that have kind of cracked this nut, this is more of a creative kind of solution or like a solution that comes out of creative professionals. Yeah. But you you look at the big ones, historically, the best ads, the best messaging, the most effective campaigns are coming out of the combined talent of design or the art side and the content side.

And you’ll see some of the best ads have been created by duos, right, where it’s two people working together, have worked on a lot of projects together, they kind of know each other. And you’ll find that they don’t always slice that ad or that campaign as like, you’re doing the art and you’re doing the content, and there’s a lot of interplay between them. I think that also just tells me, one, content is still really important. Like even the art director on that project is

probably gonna want to have some say in the content. Because they might have an idea visually that plays into the content and then the content plays back into the visuals. But I think if you start with content, you’ll find yourself less distracted. That’s been my experience as a designer. Maybe not past life, but just previous iterations of our business where I’ve been more involved in production stuff. Design’s really fun. But it also can be super distracting.

because there’s a lot of options. Content will get you down to those specifics a lot faster and will guide your ideas. You can write ideas far faster than you can draw them or concept them with visuals. And so to be able to just write and come up with ideas as you’re going, if you want to do that collaboratively, maybe you’ve got a few people on your team and you’ve got a really important campaign, do that. Do it collaboratively. But I really agree, putting the content first in your

Speaker 1 (13:55.758)
and your process is really helpful.

What if we did this right now? What if we did a B2C example of this and then, because that’s typically a little bit easier to grasp and understand, but then let’s maybe translate that into B2B, maybe more professional service. So B2C, I’m going to throw out diapers. Diapers. All right. A diaper company that is really focused on the safest materials used in their diapers.

Okay, diapers.

Speaker 2 (14:27.022)
Are they speaking to the babies in their advertising?

Last time I checked statistically, no, I don’t believe babies are reading ads.

Are they speaking to dads maybe?

Probably not Considering that let’s be honest most purchases in a household or are made by the mom Especially the diapers right? Yeah, you think about like, okay if we’re talking to moms, right? Yeah, we have to consider like, okay We we’re leaning into this core value that they might have around safety, right? Something that is gonna be really nice feels good probably but more importantly is not gonna impact their baby

Yeah, probably not.

Speaker 2 (14:49.826)
especially those diapers.

Speaker 1 (15:09.288)
in some kind of way that’s like detrimental to them. Maybe it’s skin conditions or I’d want to really hone in on that. And part of that is understanding your audience. Like go talk to some moms. What is your real concern? Why do you care that your diaper is safe? You might find that some are more inclined around something health-wise, maybe something around like I just want to know what’s in the diaper.

Thank you.

Speaker 1 (15:37.454)
Just think about lot of parents who are very concerned about what their kids eat right because they want to know what’s going in So they’re not gonna like accidentally do something to their child. Yeah, they really don’t Yep, long-term effects You know and then and then you need to understand like what are the other values that you might have in your group, right? Is there any concern with you know budget finance? Reusability sustainability environmental impact

Long-term effects.

Speaker 1 (16:05.56)
What are all the values that your group has? And then maybe identify like two or three and say, we’re gonna run some ads, one for each, right? That’s where like the specificity comes in. If you’re gonna create ads or create content on your landing page, have sections for each one. Because you don’t always know exactly who’s gonna see that. But you can start to lean in and go, where do we have clear market share? And that’s again where like the brand anthem should feed that, right?

If our entire brand is about safety on all of our product lines, then that should probably come out in this product too. That’s really our differentiator. That’s where we can prove to the market we are better than everyone else. If you have other things that are important to your audience, like the return on investment, the value that you bring from a financial standpoint, economic standpoint, or from a sustainability or environmental standpoint,

Maybe that’s not your strength, but you probably want to include that somewhere, especially like on a landing page or the product packaging, that kind of thing. So when it comes to B2C, it’s very clear, the more specific you get, the more value you bring to the market. I you see that all the way down into actual product design. And so many products now in B2C are designed for very specific people.

They might even be the same product just a little bit further down the shelf with a totally different label, totally different look, because one’s for men and one’s for women, right? I mean, that’s how this has worked in B2C for 100 years. So I think B2B is starting to catch on in that a little bit and understanding like, hey, the more specific we get, the more value we bring to the market.

Obviously you gotta play within your strengths, right? You can’t be everything to everyone. That’s what the brand anthem is supposed to help you do, is be specific for kind of a broad group, but at some level, like narrowing that beyond just everyone. Okay, well let’s move beyond that. Maybe there’s something in your geography, there’s something in your service offering, your client experience, there’s something in your industry focus, there’s something in your actual delivery of your services.

Speaker 1 (18:27.476)
that makes you unique. Let’s lean into that across the board. That’s the story we’re telling across all of our service lines. That’s what we’re telling in every message. But now, let’s talk about one service for one group of people within one industry, maybe even to one specific job title. And then really hone in on what’s really important to them.

And you touched on a little bit earlier about the medium is a big part of this. You should talk differently to a trade publication. Your ad should speak differently there than it does on your home page of your website. You’re talking to different people. Maybe there’s a geography-based newsletter that you’re putting an ad in or you’re writing an article for.

specific. Yeah, and using terms that they know and understand and and that proves that you’re really expert and you know, you can have a firm that has multiple verticals that you work in. I know many accounting firms do, lot of professional services firms do. And that’s a hard strategy to leave, right? There might be a case to be made for you to consider tightening that to be more specific even in your business model. Knowing that you can’t be competitive on all industries, like you just cannot.

So what brings your competitive advantage? It might be that you need to be more industry specific, but even if you’re gonna have multiple verticals that you’re working in, for each vertical, you almost need to treat each one like we’re gonna go to market differently with each one. What media you’re gonna create, what channels you’re gonna be in, and even the message that you’re gonna send out is gonna be a little different. You you think about like, let’s say you’re a accounting firm and you’re working with restaurants on one side and manufacturers on

Right? Those are maybe two your verticals that you’re focused on. You know, in a restaurant group, you’re probably talking to ownership more than anyone else. They probably don’t have a super sophisticated CFO type role. They might, right? They’re really sophisticated. But, you know, a small chain within your local city probably doesn’t have that. But on the manufacturing side, if you’re working with big manufacturers, they probably have very sophisticated financial controls.

Speaker 1 (20:42.37)
They’ve got a very sophisticated kind of financial group within their firm, or sorry, within their company that you need to be talking to. And so the language between those two groups is gonna be very different. Not least because their industries are different. How you talk about food and restaurant environment, it’s just different. They just use different language, different context. But even like the roles that you’re talking to, an owner versus a CFO, has different concerns, has different core values.

probably even some nuances of different personality types that tend to fall into those categories. You wanna be careful with that, because I think you can get a little too stereotypical with that. yeah, the more specific you can get, the better.

And I think that’s where you start to ask yourself these questions and you start to see the words forming on the page almost where it’s like, okay, you start with a blank page. What in the world are we gonna say? Okay, well first, who are we talking to? Okay, we’re talking to the pizza restaurant chain down the street and we really want them to know that we’re experts at auditing their financials.

I’m an expert at auditing pizza. can tell you that. Any pizza chains want to get audited? Yeah, that’s with my mouth.

I am as well.

Speaker 2 (22:02.579)
We should put that on our That’s a new service that we offer.

Taste on it. It’s a taste on it. Let’s be honest a flavor on it That sounds like a great business actually

Play around it. It’s Yeah, that’s a pizza auditing. That’s So you start to see that, you you figured out who you’re talking to specifically, and then you go back to your brand anthem and say, OK, we want to talk to them in the way that our brand talks. And now you have the person, you have the context, you have the service that you’re trying to talk to them about.

Professional taste testers.

Speaker 2 (22:34.572)
and then you have the way that you’re going to talk to them, which is informed by your anthem, your personality and your values. So now it’s like, okay, I’ve kind of got the outline for what I want to say now. And then you, you start, you know, that out.

All right, so these people are gonna care about a lot of stuff, right? Which means we’re probably gonna be writing a lot of content, right? If we’re honest, every single industry, every single role has lots of challenges, has lots of context to address. How do we do that? How do we come up with ideas for the content? What are some ways that we can do that? I’ll start, obviously, I think, I don’t know if it’s obvious.

I would encourage everyone to like talk to your business development salespeople first or in a professional services field. Maybe talk to your consultants who are working directly with the clients and say, what are the top 10 questions that you get? Yep. Either in the pre-sale process or in the client engagement. Yep. About the firm, about your expertise, about the challenges that they’re seeing. I think you could even go further and say, what are the trends that you’re seeing? You know, salespeople, business developers, even the

you know, the accountants or the consultants or the advisors on the, you know, boots on the ground. Yeah. They’re hearing what all the challenges are that they’re seeing from their clients. Yep. Ask them, what are you seeing?

That’s a great place to start. think in a professional service firm, accounting firm, that’s probably some of the partners who have been managing their own clients for years and decades. they, like you said, they’re in the trenches. They know what these people are concerned about. They know what they want and what they need help with.

Speaker 2 (24:18.134)
And so it’s like, yeah, go ask him questions about that. And then, you know, not not everybody’s going to be cookie cutter like that. No. But it informs something. And then I think, too, in the same way, like you’re talking to your own team, but go jump on a quick call with like a really good client of yours and just be honest with them like, hey, I’m just trying to figure some of these things out. Like, what do you think about this? You have something written up maybe and you run it past them. I mean, people are more than willing to do that and give you feedback on that stuff. And that’s really helpful.

I think we’ve done that a couple times and we thought we had something really great written up and they’re like, no, that doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t really connect with me. I don’t care about that. Here’s what I really care about.

Exactly. Okay, what’s keeping you up at night? Yeah, what’s got you excited? Yep. What are you looking forward to this next year? What’s maybe you know, if you’re especially if you’re talking into roles that maybe have Someone else they report to what is your boss care about? Yeah, what are they really concerned with this year? And obviously you have to have a deep enough relationship to be able to ask some of those questions I think you can you can do that those things even further right maybe do some surveying of your clients

I think there’s a great opportunity. think so often firms think about surveys as just, how are we doing? Which is a great question to ask and it’s all about the client experience and it’s about really gathering data so that you can improve that client experience. But you also need to be concerned about what they’re concerned about, right? I think that even plays into the client experience. Like if you as a firm know what’s going on with your clients and you are asking,

Ha ha.

Speaker 1 (25:56.322)
the right questions to find out what they’re concerned about. You’re obviously gonna win on the client experience side. And then also that becomes fodder for all of your marketing. Because more likely than not, if they’re concerned about stuff, I bet your prospects are too. They’re similar things. So that can be a great way to do it. I’d even say research competitors, see what they’re talking about. Now, I’d put a giant asterisk on that. What your competitors are concerned with may not be what you should be concerned with. They might have a different client mix.

They might not have a great strategy if they’re not following this process like that I would only do what they do if you’re also hearing that backed up by clients or by other industry publications associations forums, you know be kind of have a Boots on the ground ear to the ground all the time listening Yeah for what you know people care about and that’s gonna give you I mean you’ll have more topics than you’ll ever have time. Yeah

And looking at your competition too can inform what to say and how to say it. Sometimes from the standpoint of like, hey, maybe there’s a big accounting firm that just plopped an office down across the street from you. And they’re just like, you know, since 1922, and we have 53 offices across the US, we’re massive, we’re giant, and we’re here to serve you. And you’re like, we have three offices.

Can’t make that claim.

We can’t be. Nor should you, because you’re not that. So, hey, maybe we need to really lean into like we’re small, local. We love local business. We know the local businesses here to kind of set yourself apart a little bit. And that’s kind of a basic example. But, you know, not all competitor research should be like, what are they doing really well? How do we emulate that? Sometimes it’s like, what are they doing so we can do something different? Makes us stand out.

Speaker 2 (27:53.198)
Especially if your brand is a lot different than your competition.

I think another place to consider content, again, you’re telling a story in everything you do. And sometimes addressing industry trends and particular problems, that’s really good. It’s really good to showcase that you’re listening, that you care, that you’re concerned about the same things. You have answers to those kinds of questions. Certainly questions that come up in the sales process, like what do your services cost, right? What if you had content that actually spoke to that?

You don’t actually have to give a price. You just have to answer the question in some way. right. Give people the confidence that you actually know what you’re talking about, that you are a firm that really knows what they’re doing. part of that is answering the questions before they ever come up. Yeah. So that’s a great place. Those are all really important things to be talking about. I think the other piece of this is just telling the story of success, telling how you make a difference. That goes back to your brand anthem, right? What’s the best way to tell your brand anthem?

is actually by showing it, demonstrating it with case studies, with client testimonials. I love, love, love client video testimonials or case study videos where you kind of like tell the story in an engaging and fun way. I even saw one firm recently and I cannot remember for life in me what firm it was. I need to like go back and try to find them. But their homepage was literally like, it’s just a case study.

And it was like showcasing their clients. And it really put the client on display. It made them the hero of everything that was going on. Almost to a point where I was almost like, wait, what’s going on here? And it took me just a second. I’m like, oh, okay, yeah. They’re highlighting their client. That’s actually brilliant. I’m not a potential client, so I’m not seeing it in the same way they are. But that’s, I think that’s a fantastic way to come up. Like every single client engagement that you can possibly talk about, right? There’s NDAs and there’s all that fun stuff.

Speaker 1 (29:54.124)
If you can talk about it, at some level, talk about it.

Especially if the clients excited to talk about it. I think we’re we’ve seen that I don’t know the last five to ten years more of a storytelling approach and if you I mean if you go look at go look at all the the previous year’s Super Bowl ads like the companies that are spending millions and millions of dollars on these these messages and not all of them get it or are successful, but the really good ones I’ve seen in the past like five to ten years like it’s

not really about the product. It’s about like the hero, the hero of their story. It’s the customer. sometimes, mean, Super Bowl ads are probably a really bad example of that. sometimes you do, like you watch a television commercial and you’re like, is this like a commercial for like a local farm? no, no, it’s a bank. they’re showcasing how they’re loan like help them stay in business, like stuff like that where it’s like.

Thank

Speaker 2 (30:54.816)
you are showing real people and you’re showcasing them. And yeah, I think I think that would be a really I mean that that’s where again, like the message it creates itself. Your clients kind of creating it for you.

Let’s be honest, professional services, accounting firms, law firms, engineering firms to a degree, even like construction, medical, right? Anybody who’s like highly degree, highly certified, working with other businesses to improve their business, the work you’re doing itself is not super sexy. Like nobody wants to see you working in QuickBooks. Like that’s just not what anybody is like.

getting really excited to see. Now at some level they probably do actually wanna see that, because they wanna be like, do you actually do anything? You do what you say you’re gonna do. But what’s really impactful and what really gets people excited is when you showcase the difference you make. And the difference you make for a restaurant, right, is their business, their profitability, their revenue, right, their financial.

their financials, but ultimately it’s their growth. And you show that through the entire experience of their restaurant. Everything from the customer experience that they have, the food they have, the multiple locations they’re able to have because of your support and your help, right? So it’s like getting beyond just like, okay, we do tax compliance that nets you more money, I guess. Or saves you from, you know,

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:32.546)
The IRS breathing down your neck next year and instead of going okay. Well, but what does that do for them as a business? Yeah, freeze them up from risk. It provides more opportunity for them to invest It gives them opportunities to scale and grow Yeah, and so tell that whole whole story rather than just the like we did X and it netted them Why yeah, it’s like okay, that’s fine. That needs to be in there but

Get further down the line. Really show people the difference you make. I think we beat that one up pretty good. I love where we’re headed on that. you gonna nail it the first time?

No, probably not. Probably not.

First slogan I come up with is not gonna be brilliant. Kinda like our-

Probably not, Mike. just heard your ideas and I’m gonna say no on that one. No, I don’t think so. No, probably not. And if we’re, I mean, we’re talking, we’re probably talking about like, okay, you just started thinking about this and you’re like, okay, I have two hours. Let me just write down a bunch of ideas. Don’t be discouraged if you walk away from that two hours and just have nothing to work with.

Speaker 1 (33:30.542)
don’t think we even got a good one out of 10.

Speaker 2 (33:52.398)
There’s a lot that can go into that. And sometimes, you know, the further down the line you get, the more content you’ve been creating for your brand that is successful. Yeah, you might be able to put an ad together or write up a quick brief in 30 minutes and you just know exactly what you want to say because you’ve done that before and you’ve been successful. if you’re just kind of getting into this, like, what are we supposed to say as a brand? How do we message ourselves? I think a lot of a lot of firms we’ve talked to are kind of in that boat of like, OK, like, hey, maybe it’s

We just set up our CMS for the first time. Maybe we just did a big migration and now we’re really kind of like, okay, what do we say now? Or maybe, hey, just went through a rebrand and now it’s like, okay, now what do we say? We’ve got this nice new logo, we got new colors and everybody’s excited, but like, okay, what do we actually say now? It just takes time. It takes time to, there’s a lot of testing. We’ve kind of, we’ve been on that train for,

probably the last year or so now of like, you just have to test things out. There’s a lot of trial and error in that. There’s probably some internal trial and error too. Recognizing that as a marketer, you’re probably, sometimes you’ll have the final say on certain things, maybe on bigger projects. Those are being put before the partners and they’re scrutinizing it.

We would never say it that way. Yeah.

Exactly

Speaker 1 (35:19.47)
There’s a dance to be done. There is. I think that’s another piece of this is like, especially if you’re working with partners who are very involved in some of your messaging, you’re probably going to find that they push back on things that you feel are really right as a marketer. And especially if you’ve done your homework and you’re like, I know what the clients out there are talking about. I know the language they’re using. I know the concerns they have. You might find that you’ll get a little pushback more around like the wording of things than the actual core concept. Yeah.

And I think there is just a level of like incremental progress in getting better and better at it and kind of educating everyone in the firm around, hey, this worked last time. I kind of pushed the envelope a little bit. Here’s the numbers. We need to keep doing that with these other ones. It’s not really pushing the envelope. It’s just pushing everyone to think of things in terms that the client thinks of rather than the way that you as the professional think. Right, because I think we get caught

If you’re a professional, right, I’m talking to the accounts and lawyers out there, but if you’re the professional, you often get caught in the specific terms and the technical definitions of words that you use in your day-to-day work that your client may not have. They might not think of things in those same terms. Part of that is just recognizing they’re hiring you because you’re the expert in a field that they are not.

And they actually might even be turned off if you use terms that are too technical for them. And so putting it, you kind of have to do this dance of like kind of merging the two and moving your own self as the professional or moving your partners if you’re the marketer and moving them closer to the client and at the same time educating the client, right? And not making it sound like you’re talking down to them, but you’re bringing them with you to understand these terms and what they mean.

I can just attest like the professionals I’ve worked with in my life who’ve served me personally or in our business, the ones that we love are the ones that treat us like we’re not little kids or idiots, but also understand that we don’t understand all the terms. And are like, yeah, we know we’re the expert, but we’re going to help you get a little educated on this stuff too. We’ll take the time to explain a concept or put it in terms that make more sense to you. And I think that’s like the

Speaker 1 (37:43.298)
That’s the brilliance of great marketing. It’s taking things that people don’t understand that they really need and putting it in terms that they can understand and go, well, now I know why I need it, right? Yeah. Like, I kind of felt like I needed it, but I didn’t know. I didn’t know why.

Especially on the b2b side. yeah, very much so. Because there’s more education that has to happen in a b2b transition.

There’s just so much nuance. There’s so many technicalities. There’s so many different approaches to solving something too. It’s not quite as cut and dry as product. It’s like, I’m hungry, here’s candy bar.

Well, it’s a long-term relationship to We’ve seen you know where it’s not you’re not it’s not a transaction a single transaction That you’re trying to get to occur over and over at the grocery store It’s a long-term relationship that you know both sides would like most likely to last quite a while It’s easier that way right? So there’s just a lot that has to happen there Upfront from an education standpoint, and that’s where it can get a little tricky. It’s like how much do I say?

How much do I leave out? I think some of the pushback from the professional, the lawyer or the accountant could be, and we’ve seen this, like, well, that doesn’t tell me enough. They’re not gonna know. They’re not gonna know all the other stuff that we do. And there might be a little bit of education that needs to happen there too of like, let’s stay focused, stay specific.

Speaker 1 (39:20.082)
Yeah, and know that there will be opportunity to message those things later. Yeah, right. They don’t all have to happen with the first introduction to the firm.

So Mike, how do you know when you when you get it right?

Well, the numbers will tell you. that’s pretty easy. But you’ll know because people will start responding. Right. Yep. We talk a lot about resonance. Right. Your clients will resonate that back to you or your prospects in this case. Right. They’ll resonate that they will actually kind of almost like respond back either obviously through like financial response. They’re they’re like, yep, give me on a call. I want to talk about, you know, hiring you.

But it’ll also come through numbers around engagement on your content. It’ll come through in share, shareability, how much people are willing to put that out beyond themselves. I think that’s where you start to really notice those numbers. Those numbers can get a little convoluted, right? Like worrying about sharing and retweets and forwards of your email blasts, that kind of stuff. I think you can over emphasize that.

at the cost of maybe like core business goals that you’re trying to hit. But they are good indicators of like, yeah, this stuff really resonates. One of my favorite things is like, especially if you’re doing a lot of email in your marketing, how many replies back do you get? Are people saying like, I really love this. This was really helpful. Thank you. This was good. And find a way to track that. Obviously, maybe you’re sending that out as the specific professional in your firm on their behalf with their name on it and just.

Speaker 1 (40:57.974)
make sure you have a tracking system for that stuff. I think those are great measurements of are we hitting them, are we nailing it? Are we the nail on the head? How do we make sure it stays on brand? We’re actually gonna come back to this one in a later episode. So don’t know that we’re gonna be able to develop it all today. But maybe we can talk just for a minute about how do we make sure it’s still brand? It’s still us.

I think about all the time, both for our own stuff at ReSound and for clients. So often I’m going back to the remarket book, the brand handbook. You just forget over time. And if you do get stuck and you’re like, is that really us? Like, go back and look at the guidelines that you’ve set for yourself. Hopefully you’ve done that. Hopefully you have something written down that’s sort of set in stone from a brand foundation level.

and then just keep referencing back to that. And Mike, you’ve talked on this before where it’s like, hey, maybe you’re sick and tired of it. Maybe you’re tired of saying the same thing the same way. you know, you know, there’s always gonna be a tension of like, we’ve used that same color or that same word over and over and over again for we just mix it up a little bit? Can we find a new word? like, well, this is part of our core brand and no.

We’re sick of it probably, but. So there’s a little bit of that I think in everything you put together, there’s gonna be the question marks around like, this, like if I divert this way, if I go this way, does that still stay on brand? And I think you’ll know, I think as a marketer especially, if you’re in tune with your brand, you should just have a gut feeling of like, that’s not us.

No one else says.

Speaker 2 (42:48.59)
Or like, yeah, that’s it. That’s how we would say it.

Yeah, and I think going back to your brand anthem, right? Like that’s your guiding light for all of your content It’s not that your brand anthem speaks to every single potential client exactly the right way, right? But it’s a it’s a guidepost for you. Yep You know even like thinking about the mess the language that you use in your brand anthem if you’ve really dialed that in and you’ve got it on point for your brand your personality the voice tone and mood that you’re really going for

with your brand anthem, then take that and just kind of run everything you write through that lens and kind of go, does this sound like our brand anthem? Maybe influenced by it, uses some of the same language. Obviously you’re gonna have to like change it up a little bit in order to speak to different coin tell, different context, so you’re gonna have different words a little bit, but like, is there at least a flavor of your firm in everything that you write? I think another way that you can do that is look at your core values. If you have kind of slogans that go with each one,

judiciously, don’t just spam them, but include those where they make sense into the rest of your content you’re writing so that it builds this continuity of like, have a language we speak at our firm. It’s probably rooted in your core values more so than it is in market-specific or industry-specific terms. That’s when you’re talking to a client or a prospect and using terms that they use.

Those aren’t your terms, right? But your terms are ones that are rooted in your core values, your mission, your story, so really your anthem. Use that language. Find ways to include it with the very vertical specific language that you’ve been.

Speaker 2 (44:33.422)
That’s a great idea, because I think the best clients are going to be the ones that resonate with those values anyways. So if you’re starting to kind of infuse your messaging with those, you’re hopefully going to attract the right people who are like, we really like that too. man, we use that same word. They’re an accounting firm, we’re a pizza chain, but we love that. Let’s talk to them.

Maybe find the value, you know, as you’re working on the persona for that particular piece of content you’re gonna put out, right? Maybe it’s targeted at a certain industry, a certain role within that industry, you got a persona developed for that. Part of that persona should be what are the core value or values that they hold? Especially when it’s in context of the work that you do, right? Or in the context of their job. Which one of your values lines up with that? Do you have your own branded language around that value? Use that.

You don’t need to put all five values on every service page. I think that would be ridiculous. Because I’m gonna bet at least half of them don’t really pertain to that particular prospect. Maybe they have to do with internal things or they just don’t resonate with that particular industry, but I bet there’s one that does. And so find that one, use it, and if you’ve got branded language around it, maybe a slogan or a motto that you use to encapsulate that,

Now every time you use it, you start to reinforce like, you you as your firm have this specific kind of brand.

Quick example, a family owned restaurant chain and one of your values is family. That’s really easy. A cheap example, you’re not just gonna say like, oh, you know, we’re about family and so are you. It should still be hero based, right? So you’re still going to say like, hey, you’re a family owned business.

Speaker 2 (46:25.802)
We want to enable you to actually enjoy your family. Something like that where it’s not just like, hey, we do that too. Family, you, me, you, we love family too. Give us some money because we love family. Doesn’t work, Sam. doesn’t. Not for the last 40 years or so. But you still got to get creative with that. But that’s just a cheap example of like, you know, when you’re outlining some of those personas, you got to get inside of their head. What do they believe? What do they love?

What do they value?

That’s great. We had one more topic to kind hit on this, and I’m actually going to save it. So I’ll tee it up for the next. How does the media you use change the message?

mystery.

Speaker 2 (47:17.954)
The Remarca Brand Podcast is a project of ReSound and is recorded in Tempe, Arizona with hosts Mike Jones and David Kosand. It’s produced and edited by Sam Pagel. You can find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and at Remarcablecast.com. If you’d like more episodes, subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, or wherever you prefer to get your podcasts. To contact the show,

find out more about the Remarkable Brand podcast or to join our newsletter list to make sure you never miss another episode, check out our website at Remarkablecast.com. Copyright, ReSound Creative Media LLC, 2022.