What Is Your Special Sauce?
By Reid M. Neubert

A salesman walks into a bar. He tells the bartender, "I just spent two grueling hours negotiating with a customer. They finally beat me down on price to where they wanted it, then decided anything that cheap must not be any good!"

Is this how your company sells its products or services? That's not exactly the route to success. But when prospective buyers – or clients – see what you provide as a commodity, of course they are going to be looking for the best price. That's how it works.

What Is Your Special Sauce?
Instead of just selling "hamburgers," think about your special sauce. What is there that you provide that no one else does? What is the one thing that makes your business unique and especially appealing to prospects?

I don't care if you are in the hamburger business or professional services, unless you really are brand X, there is a special sauce in there somewhere. I also know that trying to identify your special sauce can be harder than finding Waldo in a candy cane factory. But it's well worth the effort.

That special sauce is something that connects with people on an emotional level. It helps them remember your "hamburger," your company, your brand. It communicates the value you provide and makes what you offer more desirable. It gives them reason to want to do business with you without beating you up on price!

Two All-Beef Patties
Let's look at an example. We were approached by a credit union that couldn't find their special sauce. They got to the point where they realized their marketing wasn't working, but didn't know why. Their president asked me if I could help.

While credit unions are member-owned, not-for-profit financial institutions, they offer basically the same financial products as banks: savings and checking accounts, credit cards, loans, etc. These are all just hamburgers.

After meeting with their management and reviewing their marketing materials, I was able to identify their problem: They didn't know what their special sauce was. So, of course, they weren't communicating it. They were just selling burgers. They weren't even selling credit union burgers. Just burgers. Even their recently redone brochures, while good looking, did nothing to differentiate them.

We had to don our Waldo glasses to find the source of their special sauce. And we did. In this case it was the fact that their loyal members love being able to communicate with them, by phone and in person. They like that real, personal contact and attention, and the fact that it doesn't cost them extra for the privilege. Plus, with the low employee turnover the credit union enjoys, members can develop on-going relationships with the people they have contact with.

That's very different than the typical consumer bank that tries to minimize personal contact because of the expense involved. It is a very special situation – a special sauce, in fact – but, as is typical, one the organization couldn't identify for itself.

After determining this, we recommended that both their business development and member-retention marketing communicate the personal, one-to-one attention their members enjoy. In the creative phase, we proposed a specific type of photographic imagery to use in conjunction with a new verbal message to effectively communicate their special sauce in their marketing.

Special Sauce or Commodity
Many, perhaps most, businesses feel they cannot come up with an effective brand differentiation, because their business isn't really distinctive like consumer brands are. Well, here is an interesting fact: most leading brands are, in fact, commodity products. Coca-Cola, often cited as the most valuable brand in the world, is a brand of what? Soda pop. That is certainly a commodity. Nike – athletic shoes and apparel. Kinko's – copy centers. Starbucks – coffee. All commodities. The difference is, they know what their special sauce is.

People don't think of these top brands as commodities because their brand images make them seem like so much more. And that is exactly the point of building a compelling brand! That way, when you are doing business development or your salesperson walks in to see a prospect, what you are offering is something that is known, credible, and desirable.

If athletic shoe and soft drink companies can be successful by building strong brands, what is holding yours back?
 

Copyright 2007 by Reid M. Neubert. All rights reserved.