Your marcom copywriter asks the question first—to get you to get in touch with who you are, what you do, what you are selling, who you’re selling to, and the market share you’re after. It’s only the first of many questions that are used to drive the creation of the messaging platform. The goal is to get every employee and every marcom tool in every media channel delivering the same brand story—one that builds brand awareness and increases brand recognition. One that makes money.

Easy enough to understand. But as you dig deeper it becomes apparent that there’s more to this than meets the eye. Building consensus within the organization about what the brand is, how it should be positioned in the marketplace through what type of tools and in what channels, is the first hurdle. Then it’s time to create the building blocks that form the messaging platform—before you can communicate your brand message, you need to define the company mission, the vision, the brand essence, the brand personality, what makes you unique, etc.  Each of these components are molded to formulate an effective messaging platform that positions an industry-leading brand. It’s what you say…and how you say it.

The goal is to get your point across clearly with a targeted message that gets results—in all media channels. At its kernel, the messaging pitch is a tagline. In an elevator, you have less than 60 seconds to make your point. In print collateral, the message is expanded with the challenge to hold the reader’s attention. On your website content, the message tells the brand story.

MarCom Point.Solutions Case Study

Tagline: Messaging with a Point

Elevator Pitch: I help my clients say what they think they’re saying…get their message out…and their point across. I deliver innovative, customized, persuasive content marketing, copy writing, editing and proofreading of web sites, brochures, mail campaigns, scripts, and marketing materials to build brand awareness and corporate identity. I have coined the tagline: Messaging with a Point, to describe the unique type of writing services I deliver.

Print Collateral: The MarCom Point.Solutions brand is positioned in the marketplace with the attributes of creativity, sophistication and vitality—ready to quickly embark and deliver on time, on budget, and on point. The logo design emphasizes the word point within the company name and the Messaging with a Point tagline. Make your point…and you make money. Get your point across…and get ahead.

Website: Getting to the core of what should be communicated is the issue: Are you really saying what you think you’re saying? Is your messaging clear? Does your corporate identity align with your image? Nine times out of 10, questions need to be answered due to lack of clarity…a missed point. Make sure you never miss a point again—get Messaging with a Point.

Is your pitch on point?

Building the brand internally first cements loyalty and brings the message externally, naturally. How your clients feel about your organization is based on the identity you portray in the marketplace and how you deliver on your brand promise.

Defining the organization attributes—the brand—starts to uncover the foundation of the value proposition—the lifeforce of the messaging. What do you say? How do you say it? What does it look like? A Corporate Identity System protects and reinforces your brand. It ensures that whenever anyone is looking at any marketing communications issued by your organization they can easily be identified. Every employee in your organization bears responsibility for adhering to the corporate identity to ensure a consistent brand message is delivered.

Word of Mouth starts with just one person. It is the core of customer relationships. Make one customer happy and they will communicate their satisfaction. And that person tells another person, and so on. It grows exponentially. But WOM is only one part of an integrated marketing campaign. And it can’t be effective unless the word gets out first—through innovative, persuasive messaging. You need to enter the marketplace with a strong brand message and start the conversation through on-point marketing communications—and then WOM can take off.

Everyone’s got an opinion—and everyone wants to express it. We have the option to Review, Like, Comment, Tweet or even Retweet. Millions of opinions about the best product or service are communicated every hour. If you think about it, you probably make a recommendation to a colleague or friend at least once a day—whether it’s your new fave restaurant, store, product or even person to do business with.

The bottom line: One customer who expresses their satisfaction through WOM can make a difference in your business.

There is no secret. There are a myriad of sales philosophies and systems that prove to be successful. But there’s no magic pill to guarantee that every proposal you deliver will convert. There is only one winner for the business.

On second thought, maybe there is a secret: Keep getting up to bat and your percentage will increase.

These are the 10 steps I follow:

1. Listen carefully.
2. Clarify scope.
3. Align the solution to the business strategy.
4. Create a compelling proposal.
5. Address client pain points.
6. Deliver added value.
7. Demonstrate expertise.
8. Provide transparent pricing model.
9. Build a partnership.
10. Close the deal.

My initial goal was to blog once a week—but then I amped it up to once a day. My dilemma is that now that I am on a short-term, on site engagement with one of my clients, I’m finding that my time is totally focused on the client. I’m involved in lots of great projects, mind you, but still not meeting my goal is disturbing.

So I’ve had to rethink the strategy. And it’s taken me several weeks to come to terms with the fact that I may not be able to blog every day—or once a week—unless I want to hire someone to write for me. But I really like blogging and don’t want to give it up. So I apologize in advance if there seems to be some lag time between my posts, but know that I am busy writing and editing marketing communications and brand messaging—knocking out direct-mail campaigns, newsletters, website content, industry reports, perspectives and event promotional materials.

My big project right now is developing a Corporate Identity System. Love doing these. I enjoy the challenge of creating the brand story, developing the brand messaging, communicating tips and techniques, and organizing the information for best readability. Every company should have a Corporate Identity System (CIS) to ensure their brand is being communicated consistently. Delivering the final draft on Monday—got to jump.

1. Review the copywriter’s portfolio—see if you like their writing style
2. Establish how much guidance you want to deliver—do you want a copywriter who’s hand you have to hold or a copywriter who can get what you need through a quick chat
3. Determine if you are comfortable working with the copywriter—that you’re on the same page and have the same work habits
4. Cross-check experience against the type of copywriting you need—to get the Messaging with a Point you need to get results
5. Ensure you understand exactly what you want to communicate—and express it clearly to the copywriter

Once you find the right copywriter—you can be partners for life.

So I traded a unique selling proposition for a value proposition. I think the transition for me was based on the fact that the B2B market affords me the opportunity to write for a broader range of marketing communications products. The geat American novel has no allure for me. I just love to write to sell. To write innovative, persuasive copy that makes an impact and gets results. I call it Messaging with a Point.

But design is more than the logo. It’s more than where the images are placed. How many graphics to include. Where they should be inserted into the content. Or the layout of the page.

The writer needs to think visually, as well as the designer. How should the copy be set up to emphasize the message? Where can subheads be added—to not only provide a thread for the brand story, but to add white space so that the page has air and is easy to read? What copy should be bold? Would bulleted lists enhance readability? The effectiveness of the message is enhanced by good design—both copy and graphics.

And just as the writer can enhance the design—the designer can enhance the copy. I cannot tell you how many times an art director has come up with a killer headline. In marketing communications, writing and design are inseparable.