Use This Critical Statement to Generate Better Leads and More Sales
There is one statement that’s more important than every other statement on your website.
This statement has the power to grab the attention and imagination of your most ideal customers.
It places you in a completely different ballpark from your competitors.
It creates demand for your brand at a higher price point.
What is this unicorn of a statement on your website? It’s your core message.
Your core message is the most important statement on your company website, because it creates a differentiator between you and your competition that your customers are willing to pay more for.
In this article, we’ll do a deep dive on your core message and show you how to create one that elevates your brand above the competition.
Related: When Your Competition Claims the Same Differentiator As You
What Is a Core Marketing Message?
Essentially, your core message is your company’s unique selling proposition (USP). It’s a short, one- or two-sentence statement that declares how you stand apart from the competition. Your core message should be front and center on your website as an identity that you can rally behind. It should be the core of your marketing messaging, the cornerstone of everything you do and say.
As John Jantsch says, your core message is like a talking logo. It captures the differentiating essence of your company in a short and pithy statement. Your differentiating message should define who you are to your customers.
But the core message doesn’t simply state how you’re different — it states how you’re different in a way that your customers care about.
For example, your customers probably won’t be impressed that your company has been around since 2004. They don’t care that you’re the trusted source of solutions in your industry. And it doesn’t matter that you have the deepest expertise in your niche.
Why? Because that’s just table stakes. Your customers already assume you have a certain level of experience, expertise, and trustworthiness — otherwise you wouldn’t be in business. What they’re looking for is something worth paying for.
Your customers want you to show them why they’ll gladly pay more for your product or service.
“Security without compromise” — Black Kilt Security
Elements of a Core Message
Most company websites have some kind of unique selling proposition that they use to hang their identity on. And that’s a good starting point. But the vast majority of core marketing messages fail, because brands don’t understand the critical elements of a core message.
Their messages are all about themselves. They’re boring. They simply describe their product. Now how is that supposed to generate better leads and win more sales?
Their lousy messaging is good news for you, because it sets the bar pretty darn low. Employ these essential core messaging elements for your brand, and you’ll set your company up to be heard above the herd.
“Be all that you can be” — United States Army
Related: Use Your Brand Voice to Hit Higher Notes in B2B Marketing
Pain points
Your core marketing message isn’t about you, it’s about your customers. Your customers don’t care about your company — they just care about finding solutions to their problems. An effective differentiating message speaks to customers’ pains and frustrations.
Believe it or not, an effective differentiating message might not directly address the problem that your product fixes. For example, customers expect an IT company to solve their hosting issues — but what they really want is a vendor who never makes them wait for an answer. Or, they want a payroll company that refuses to make promises it can’t keep.
Find the pain you address that no one else does, even if it’s tangential to the solution you sell.
“Democracy Dies in Darkness” — Washington Post
Promise
An effective USP communicates a promise that flows out of customers’ pain points. It’s hopeful, positive, and inspiring. It should be a solution-oriented statement that gives customers something to look forward to.
Give your customers something to expect from you that no one else delivers.
“That was easy.” — Staples
Emotion
Every core message worth its salt evokes emotion. Don’t go overboard with it, or you’ll earn more smirks than sales. But definitely connect to your customers’ emotions. Even in the B2B world, your customers make buying decisions based on emotions first, and data second.
If your core message — the foundation of your marketing — isn’t emotionally compelling, how can you expect to move anyone towards a purchase?
Connect with your customers’ gut, not their cerebrum.
“Just do it.” — Nike
Differentiation
By now I shouldn’t have to say it, but of course I’m going to: your differentiation isn’t your experience, your price, or your authority. Practically every brand claims to do what they do longer, better, cheaper, or faster than the competition. None of that makes you different, it makes you the same.
More likely, your differentiation is the way you do what you do. It might have to do with your mission, your ethics, or your culture. It could be a process that no one else follows.
Ebook: 7 Steps to Small Business Marketing Success
How to Create Your Company’s Core Message
The worst way to create your core message is to lock yourself in your office, think about how your company is different from the competition, and hammer out a differentiating statement.
Even worse than the worst way is to do it as a committee.
The truth is, you probably don’t know what your actual differentiator is. You have blinders on that you aren’t even aware of. You see your brand from the inside, not from the customer’s perspective. It’s like trying to see yourself without a mirror.
Your customers are the real authority on your differentiator. They’re the ones who know why they initially bought from you, and why they keep buying from you. So ask them what makes you unique.
“Compliance management sucks. We make it suck less” — Total Compliance Tracking
Do your research
Conduct five to seven interviews with customers who know and love your company. Ask them a set of open-ended questions that get at the difference you provide. I recommend hiring a third party to do the interviews, so that you’ll get more honest responses. (Good Gnus can help with that!)
- Here’s a set of questions that I like to use:
- Tell me about the work that we’ve done for you.
- What problems were you dealing with before hiring us?
- Why did you choose our company in the first place?
- Why do you stay with us?
- What do we do for you that no one else does?
- Do you refer us to others? If so, what do you say? If not, why not?
Pro tip: watch for opportunities to use customer comments as testimonials — with their permission, of course.
Also mine the customer reviews you get on Google and other sites.
Find the theme in the haystack
Once you’ve gathered all your customer input, look for common themes that rise to the surface. Look for provocative statements, bold claims, or other comments that grab your attention — these can often be rich fodder for the next step of the process.
As you identify the common themes, some of them will resonate strongly with you. That’s the gold. Zero in on those themes and find the one that best captures your vision of who you are.
Pro tip: Use an AI program to analyze the transcripts and identify repeated elements. It’ll save a ton of time!
“The power of certainty” — Tanium
Write a ton of ideas
Now comes the fun part. Draft a boatload of core messages that capture the theme you’ve identified above. Get creative, and use direct quotes from your customers as inspiration.
Your draft core messages should include the elements I listed earlier:
- Pain points
- Promise
- Emotion
- Differentiation
Keep the core messages short and sweet — just a sentence or two. They should be interesting and should fit your company’s brand personality.
Find the gem
Once you’ve got a few dozen candidates on paper, it’s time to kill, keep, and combine.
- Delete the messages that stink.
- Keep the ones that you can live with.
- Combine similar messages as it makes sense.
Take the new list and repeat the kill/keep/combine process until you have about five draft core messages to consider. Feel free to refine messages along the way, if you find opportunities to improve them.
Now that you have five potential core messages, share them with others to get feedback. Survey your leadership, your customers, and your partners.
Then, make the call.
“Be heard above the herd” — Good Gnus
Own Your Differentiator!
Congratulations! You now have a core marketing message that sets you apart from the competition and communicates your unique differentiator to customers.
Now use that core message as the cornerstone of all your marketing content. It should drive your identity, and it may even drive your operations — especially if your core message is based on how you do what you do.