Crafting Your USP - It's Not What You Do It's How You Do It

There are very few totally unique business types in this world (and if they start out unique they don't stay that way for very long).That means there are thousands of businesses in the same industry as yours.

So what makes you different from them?Why should people buy from you and not them?

In the past, businesses focused on tangible things such as price, product range and decor to try and make themselves stand out.That is fine as far as it goes, but all of these can be replicated.

If you compete on price there will always be someone who will undercut you.If you compete on range then someone will extend their range or mirror your product range.These are all temporary solutions.

If you want to create a business with longevity you need to be aware that what people really buy is something intangible.Every business creates a feeling or emotion that goes beyond what you do.It is this feeling or emotion that is the true essence of your USP.

To start with you need to look at what human needs you are fulfilling.Abraham Maslow back in 1943 proposed that people have different human needs.At the base level are the physiological needs for survival - food, water and sleep.Without these needs being met, then the body shuts down.

Next come the safety and security needs - personal safety, financial security, health and well-being.These needs take over when the base needs are generally met.

Next come the social needs - a need for belonging, for close friendships and supportive communities.

Next comes self esteem, respect by others, respect for others, confidence and achievement.

Finally comes self-actualisation - the need to maximise your potential.

While Maslow has his detractors, it is still a very useful model to consider.When you are in business you are really in the business of satisfying one or more of these human needs.But it is how you satisfy these needs that makes your business stand apart from others.

Take motels which provide a bed to sleep in.If it were as simple as just providing a bed then all motels would be the same, but motels provide much more.Some provide a safe haven, others provide a family atmosphere.Some are status symbols that show a person has "arrived" and others provide opportunities for personal reflection and growth.

But within these options the motels you are happiest in are the ones that make you feel a certain way.Think about ...you can be staying at the highest quality hotel, but if you are treated like garbage then you won't want to return.If you are treated with value and respect, then you will feel important and want to replicate this feeling.

There have been some studies that have shown that the greatest predictor of whether or not a doctor will be sued is not whether he or she made a mistake, it is how they made the patient and their family feel when they treated them.If they made a mistake but still were caring and made the patient feel valued, then the likelihood of being sued was dramatically less.

What makes a business totally unique is the feeling they give to their consumers.This feeling is intangible and can be broken in an instant if you do not act consistently with the feeling.It can also be the strongest bond on earth that attracts customers to you as if by magic if your business is truly in alignment with this feeling.

It is this feeling that needs to be reflected in all of your marketing, in all of your copywriting, all of your business images and all of your thoughts and actions.When you do this, then customers naturally are attracted to you and your marketing is much more effective.

So how do you put into words the unique feeling you give to people?

First you need to discover what that feeling is.You can do this through a range of means: talking with your favourite clients, listening to your employees when they talk about your business, taking time to reflect or meditate on the peak interactions you have had around your business.You can even have someone interview you to quietly tease out the threads of this feeling and help you put it into words.

Generally you will get snippets of words, fragments of ideas and wisps of concepts.By weaving these wisps together and then testing them with people to gauge their response, you will begin to be able to craft together the right words.

It may take quite a few variations to get the combination of words right, but when you do will you will have a solid "yes" in your heart.

Creating your USP this way is more challenging than having a marketing company go away and "write one for you", but it is a more fulfilling and more successful process.A good marketing company or copywriter will help you through this process so your end marketing material resonates with the true essence of your business.

Once you know how you want to make people feel, then you need to review all of your business processes and actions to ensure you give that experience in everything that you do.

After all ...it is how you do what you do that really makes the most difference in business.

About the Author

Ingrid Cliff is a freelance writer and the Chief Word Wizard of Heart Harmony - a writing services studio that helps put your business into words.

For a free copy of the "7 Secrets of Compelling Copy & Powerful Words" visit her website http://www.heartharmony.com.au "> www.heartharmony.com.au .

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• Expand Website Conversion with Better Communication
• A PPC Professional Guide To Successful PPC Campaigns
• Drive Traffic Using the Tell-A-Friend Script

Search Engine Optimization - The Importance of Great Quality Content

It is a basic rule of marketing, for businesses both on and off the web.You need to know your customer, and sell the benefits to the customer, not the products.Not many people care about the streamlining of a vacuum cleaner bag, but there are plenty of overworked stay at home parents out there that care about how much time it takes them to vacuum the house.This basic web marketing strategy is employed by all successful websites, to create quality content that brings great search engine optimization results, and perhaps even the holy grail of internet marketing services the top Google ranking.We look at how to modify your webpage content for search engine ranking optimization and internet marketing success.

It is known as the "What's in it for me?" rule, and copywriters live by it.You need to be able to put yourself in your customer's shoes, forgetting everything you know about your business, to be able to write website copy that furthers your internet marketing strategy.You can market to one of several desires in you customers: the desire for health, wealth, good relationships, or sex.

Internet Marketing to a combination of these is often even more effective - as long as you maintain specific branding.If your customers are looking for job-related content, you will be using at-work emotions in your web marketing strategy and search engine ranking optimization campaign like: the EASE with which work can be performed, the SAFETY of a job (how likely an employee is to be retrenched or company to go broke), employee's or companies GREED for a better salary or bigger profits, POWER in the workplace, or EGO - having your performance recognized as better than others by your peers.

Every word of copy you write for your website should be filtered through the automatic "What do I care?" screen, with you thinking as a customer would.You often need to go a step further in internet marketing strategies, analyzing the words that people use in their searches instead of the industry speak for a phenomenon or event.For example, airlines use the words "low fares", customers search for the words "cheap flights".Your internet marketing services company or search engine optimization service can tell you which words your customers use to find you, and also to find your competitors, and help you integrate these into your copy.

Internet marketing services often do customer profiling, or creating personas, as it is known among internet consultancy services.This involves putting a gender, age, and other demographic profile to your typical customers.This allows your web marketing strategists to devise campaigns that really get results.When you have persona information for your site, you are not assuming you know your customer - you really do know your customer.Even Google advises this in their quality guidelines for webmasters - they say " Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines.Don't deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users" - nothing annoys a user more than not finding the content they were looking for.

Google's words of wisdom on internet marketing services continue, with " Another useful test is to ask, 'Does this help my users?Would I do this if search engines didn't exist?' ".

It is essential that businesses have expert help in writing their website content.Tricks like keeping one idea to a paragraph, writing in the inverted pyramid style and with additions like highlighted text, extra subheadings and objective language builds your opportunities to connect with consumers, but requires expert implementation.

About the Author

InetAsia Solutions - Inetasia is a new breed of Internet consultancy.

InetAsia is the official WebTrends distributor for South East Asia, Hong Kong and Southern China.The principal services include Web Analytics, Search Engine Optimization and Internet marketing services.

Relaited Links:

• Informational Products On How To Market Your Website!
• 5 Cool Ways Teens Make Money Online
• A PPC Professional Guide To Successful PPC Campaigns

5 Cool Ways Teens Make Money Online

The ideas below all work online, most without having your own website.Several companies have set up revenue sharing lately, and you can benefit.Without ever learning Java, HTML, or Flash, you can set up your own little kingdom or queendom of money earning sites.

Take a look at these:

1.

Studentoffortune.com

This is a paid research site, where a student or teen can post a question with a bounty, then you can answer and win the bounty.

Do you have a cool hobby?Read a bunch of books on one subject?Maybe you work in your parents' business.You can earn money from this site.Everybody knows about something.

2.Treasuretrooper.com

Lets you fill out surveys that pay or offer free goodies.

In case you think this won't work well, think about this.Companies pay people to try their stuff, to comment on it, and to give the company their opinion.You could be one of those people, getting paid for your opinion.Available to teens over 13 can make money with this.Pretty sweet, right?

3.Cashcrate.com

Works similar to #2, but some like it better.

Either way, you make money for college.Also available to teens over 13 with parental permission.

4.Squidoo.com

you can build a lens (to focus on a topic) for free, then you can add in affiliate links, adsense and so on to earn some money from it.

The key here: think broad, and update often.Hubpages.com has an approach similar to Squidoo, but offers a one-time payment for doing serious work on a page.You have to meet their guidelines, but then you get $25 for building a resource page.

5.Build your own Website

When you do it right, you can build a great website, even if you have no programming or web design skills.

Seriously, you can make money in a ton of ways, too, like your own list, advertising, and selling your own products.And if you build your own site, you can keep it forever.Be careful what host you pick.Find one with a great block builder and the right formula for success.

6.An extra: be an affiliate.

This works best if you have a site, but you can also use your Myspace or Facebook page.You earn with this by first affiliating with an online seller.They can sell anything, you just need to be their affiliate.

Then, you tell people about it.Careful - you don't want to spam yourself off of Myspace or Twitter.But you can help people find answers and refer them to the company you represent.Just do a little search for affiliate programs on a search engine, you'll be swamped with good opportunities.

Better yet, pick a product, and then add affiliate program to it, then search.

My Experience

When I was a teen, I tried painting house numbers on curbs, mowing lawns, and washing cars.

Here's another idea for you: set up a webpage on your hobby, then sell advertising to Google and Commission Junction or tons of other places.

You can check out the Google Adsense program for more, or hop over to some places like CJ and learn how they work.Pretty cool programs, and I am earning with them.

Basically, you just write up some good information about your hobby, what you do, some pictures, how to do it right.Get it online on a few pages.Then talk about your pages to friends, in your emails, on forums or your favorite social site.No selling yet, just good information.

This will bring some traffic.Do tons of this stuff, without trying to sell anything.When you have some traffic, you go to Google's program and apply to get in.After that, you cut and paste some ads and stuff.When people like the ad, you'll get paid a bit.Over time, it adds up and makes a great little business.

You can find tons more of these kinds of offers if you look.It only takes effort.Teens make money online just like this.

Get started!

About the Author

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Relaited Links:

• Crafting Your USP - It's Not What You Do It's How You Do It
• Informational Products On How To Market Your Website!
• Creating A Pay Per Click Campaign

What Are Private Label Rights: How Can You Make Money with PLR?

There are a number of ways you can use Private Label Rights (PLR) content in your quest to earn money online.You may have a number of PLR reports, ebooks, or series of articles taking up space on your hard drive right now.Dust them off and let's put them to use.

What is PLR and How Is It Different From Public Domain Material?
Private Label Rights content is written material that is offered to more than one person for their own use.The rights granted can range from the right to use the information for personal use only, to allowing the person to put their name on it, change it, sell it and resell it.The next section gives a more extensive description of rights.You are probably already familiar with private label rights products.If you've ever been in a grocery store or drugstore, you've seen the store brand being sold next to the national brand of medicines, canned foods, toilet paper and lots of other products.Those are private label products.

What we refer to here as PLR material is written content, but private label rights can be applied to graphics, videos, and software.There is even music PLR.

Public Domain is not the same thing as PLR.Public Domain material is the material where the copyright has expired.Public Domain content can be packaged and sold, or incorporated in a derivative work but it can not be edited, or claimed as your own work.The author's name has to remain on the work.

Public Domain material can be accessed by anyone and used by anyone.PLR content usually has a limited distribution.

Examples of Rights Granted For PLR

There are lots of ways you can make money using Private Label Rights written materials.

Most PLR comes with limitations on how it can be used.When buying PLR make sure you understand the rights.If you don't agree with the rights don't buy the content.

[YES] Private use
Learn from the materials but you can't do anything else with the content.

[YES] Can be sold
Sell the content as an ebook and keep the profit.
Set up an affiliate program and your affiliates can sell the content as long as you remain in control of it.You have to provide the download link and collect the money and pay your affiliates.Or you can use a program such as Clickbank which collects the money and then pays you and the affiliate.

[YES] Can be given away as an incentive
Use the content as a freebie to motivate people to sign up for your list.
Or just give it away.

[YES] Can be packaged with other paid products
If you have other materials on the same subject that you're selling, combine the content and sell it all together.

[YES] Can be offered as a bonus with paid product
Give the content as a bonus when you sell a product.

[YES] Can Be submitted to article directories (follow their Terms of Service - TOS)
If the article directory says the content has to be 100% written by you, or you have to have exclusive rights to the content, you can't submit PLR content.
You can rewrite it to fit their TOS.

[YES] Can be used as web content
self explanatory

[YES] Can be used as an e-course/autoresponder sequence
Set it up as a series for your autoresponder or sell it as an e-course that's set up on an autoresponder.

[YES] Can be used as blog posts
Self explanatory

[YES] Can be broken down into smaller articles
Break the ebook or report into smaller chunks and use those as articles, web pages or blog posts.

[YES] Can be combined to create longer articles
Combine shorter articles into a longer article.
Or combine a number of shorter articles into a report or ebook.

[YES] Can be edited.
You can change the content however you wish, as much or as little as you wish.

[YES] Can have your name put on them
Put your name on the material as the author.

[YES] Can sell Resale Rights
Selling the rights to resell the content.
The person you sell resale rights to can then sell the content without paying you any additional money.But that person can't sell the rights to sell the content to anyone else.Resale rights don't mean you can change the content, add to it, edit it, or put your name on it, unless these other rights are granted as well.

[YES] Can sell Master Resale Rights
One step further than resale rights.
The person can sell the rights to sell the content to anyone else and they can then resell the content and so forth.

[YES] Can sell Private Label Rights
Selling the private label rights to the material.

[YES] Can be added to membership sites

The material is added to a membership site.

There are several different kinds of membership sites.And some writers differentiate the rights based on whether the membership is paid or free.Or whether the content is informational only (personal use) for the members or any rights can be passed on to the members.

[YES] Can be offered through auction sites
Can be sold or given away through an auction site.

About the Author

Free report Pump UP Your Profits With Private Label Right Content Dee Power is the author of several nonfiction books and 30 Day Action Plan Earn Money Online System.

Try the first 3 days at no charge.

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