How to Use Your Brand's USP to Boost Lead Generation Opportunities

In the B2B marketplace far too many companies look and sound the same. For the customer there is little to choose between them -- except perhaps price.

The reality is, unless you have a distinctive voice you won't be remembered and your customers will have no reason to buy from you rather than the competition.

But there are companies that do stand out from the crowd; companies that immediately spring to mind for a certain product or service. So what can we learn from them?

Developing a unique voice

Essentially they present themselves in a distinctive way and in a manner that ticks all the boxes for a particular audience or niche in the market. This is important whether you are talking face-to-face with a prospect or buying ad space in the mass media. In turn this unique voice, and the issues it addresses, serves to attract new customers. In other words it can be a lead generation machine for your business.

If everyone else is pushing how lightweight their product is, then make yours stand out on styling, or if they are all selling style then highlight how yours can be personalised. Choose something that's different. But beware -- if that difference doesn't speak to your customers then you still won't stand out.

A good USP significantly improves the marketability of your product or service by addressing a recognised need or pain point for the prospect. It also helps you pre-open customers' and investors' wallets.

A good example is FedEx. They have an outstanding USP: When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight. They are addressing the need for fast, timely and secure delivery of important documents.

Your USP is the distilled essence of what you are offering and what your company is about. It should be so compelling that it could be written on a board in front of your shop, if you had one, and can be quoted when meeting potential customers.

How to use your USP to generate new leads

The most important thing is to have your target client profile clearly defined. The target profile will help you quickly discard bad or borderline leads so you can focus on ones worth pursuing. With the wide availability of information on the web, researching a lead is quick and easy.

The message you put out in all your communications: website, direct mail, email, brochures, phone scripts, etc., should be centred around the attributes of your ideal client and contain elements of your USP. Your materials and your USP should appeal to your target prospects and deter others.

Strive as much as possible to induce a self-selection process among your pool of possible prospects, so your different lead generation channels feed you leads that are predisposed to buy from you. A clear USP helps this process happen naturally.

If you have a sales team, coordinate your lead generation campaigns with them so they can time their activity accordingly and they can follow-up and refer to campaign pieces. Some of the leads you generate will already be in buying mode but your overall objective is getting qualified leads, so focus on getting them engaged and entering your sales funnel. If they have been attracted by your USP then it's relatively safe to assume your USP is addressing their needs -- focus on this and decide how to exploit the USP from different angles.

You should then sell the next stage of your sales process. For example, free exploratory meeting or free report download in exchange for contact details or a free sample of your product. The simple act of asking people to do something to receive an item usually has tremendous effect in weeding out non-interested prospects.

The vast majority of the recipients of your materials will delete or throw them away. A significant number will do it because it is simply not the right time for them to purchase your product. So you need to include some physical or electronic item (one-page sheet with tips, for example) as a "forget-me-not", so you remain on their mind.

In addition, plan to include a way for the recipient to forward your material to other contacts if they are not interested. This will expand the reach of your lead generation activity by up to 25 per cent.

Finally, make your prospects fill in a form with basic information about them and their company. This will achieve two critical results: you will build your database for subsequent campaigns and only truly interested prospects will bother to complete the form, improving the pre-selection.

Keeping your target client profile in mind, think about the best combination of online and offline tools that will get people to enter your sales funnel. Whatever you do, don't rely on only one lead generation channel. Things change. Your local newspaper might fold, your co-marketing partner might move into different products, a web portal might change its design and ad policy. Test other sources on a small scale and if successful, add them to your marketing system.

Ensure that you always use your USP in all your marketing and lead generation. Remember, your USP is not just a simple slogan or tagline. It is the mainstay, the common thread of all your communications; it should spark interest and single you out as the best choice in the eyes of your target customers. Once you have achieved that then lead generation will improve immensely -- all you need to do is capture those leads and convert them.

To get more information on Demand Generation, please visit our website at http://www.b2bmarketing.net

Roderic Michelson may be contacted at

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