1. PUBLISHED BY: ONMESSAGE, A MESSAGING INFUSION COMPANY
November 2013
TIPS FOR SETTING YOUR
STORY STRAIGHT IN 2014
5

2. With the New Year just around the corner, now is the time to
set your company’s story straight and develop a more clear,
compelling corporate message. This executive brief contains
critical knowledge and best practices that will help you…
> Evaluate your corporate messaging
> Make sure your story is relevant
> Choose words that are meaningful to your customers
> Deliver a consistent message throughout the customer experience
> Create more engaging customer conversations

3. TIP 1: EVALUATE YOUR CORPORATE Messaging
Did you know?
…that more than 65 percent of sales leaders feel they’re losing business because they don’t have a
compelling value proposition?
…or that conversations with employees account for 53 percent of the reason why prospects choose
one company over another?
If you don’t have a story that is clear, compelling, consistent and connects with your target
audience, it can have a negative impact on your business.
To help you increase the impact messaging has on the financial performance of your business,
we’re providing you with this complimentary Executive Brief. By reviewing this brief, you’ll be
able to answer these critical questions and evaluate the effectiveness of your story:
• How closely aligned is our messaging with our business strategy?
• Does our message resonate and connect with customer needs?
• Is our message ownable and truly different from our competitors?
• How consistently is our message delivered inside and outside of our organization?
• Is the message we are sending really what our audience hears and remembers?
• Is the value we deliver clear and compelling to our target audience?
Your sales conversations rely on true messaging alignment and solid storytelling. Don’t waste
another minute losing revenue – explore the six dimensions of messaging effectiveness today.

4. TIP 2: Make sure your story is relevant
Henry Ford. Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Steve Jobs. Each of these iconic leaders understood the
importance of staying relevant as the key to engaging in meaningful conversations with customers.
The truth is, it really doesn’t matter how superior your product or service is compared to the
competition. What matters is communicating a message that is relevant and meaningful to
your target audience. Relevance equates to significance. It’s the connection between what you
do and the pain points, issues or aspirations your target audience faces each day. To establish
significance in the mind of your prospects and customers, you must first clearly understand their
emotional, psychological and economic point of view. Then you have to connect those insights
with the primary messages you use to build your story. Do you “really” know what drives the
behavior and decisions of your target audience? Test your knowledge by asking yourself these
few questions:
1. What are the demographics of your buyer? This includes the buyer’s gender, age,
education, geographic location and economic position.
2. What are the buyer’s personal and business goals? How can your products or services
help them reach these goals?
3. What barriers, industry trends or competitive threats do your potential buyers face?
How does your product/service enable them to overcome or capitalize on these issues?
4. What personal and business factors do these individuals take into account when
making a buying decision? How does your message address and demonstrate how you
can help them navigate these factors?
5. What are the spending habits of your buyer (both personally and professionally) and
why do they make these purchases?
Developing messaging is easy. Creating messaging that is relevant, engaging and viewed as
significant by your target audience is the challenge. It all starts with having a clearly defined and
detailed perspective crafted from your customer’s point of view.

5. In business-to-consumer (B2C) marketing, the buyer is typically also the end user. However,
in business-to-business (B2B) marketing, the buyer is usually not the end user. The purchasing
process is much more complex, involving more departments, more audiences and more decision-
makers. Is this why B2B messaging often sounds more elaborate, like in this example from a
recent Inc. Magazine article?
“Salesforce.com, the enterprise cloud computing company, today announced new next
generation social analytics for the Marketing Cloud. With the expanded Marketing Cloud
ecosystem, which now includes 20 industry leading social analytics vendors, companies
are able to make better business decisions based on the massive amounts of social media
data created every day, all from a single dashboard.”
Even though the B2B sales process is more arduous, this does not mean your message has to be
complicated. B2B messaging can be simple and straightforward, without losing your key point of
difference and the value you deliver. The truth is if you can’t quickly explain why your customer
needs your product, then you are not focusing enough on the critical pain point you solve or the
core value your product delivers.
To deliver messaging in a simple (not simplistic) and straightforward way, follow these guidelines:
Don’t construct messaging by “committee.” Getting input from relevant stakeholders
(especially customers and prospects) is critical, but when it comes to formulating (writing) your
messaging – don’t let too many cooks in the kitchen. Often times, once the message has been
constructed based on research and input gathered, companies try to accommodate feedback on
the messaging from too many multiple stakeholders. This usually results in a message littered
with noise that distracts from the simple, straightforward message that was originally developed.
Don’t complicate the message with industry jargon. In the example above, phrases
like “marketing cloud ecosystem” tend to conjure up confusing imagery. Be willing to let go of
those terms that are only used by people on the “inside.” These words take up valuable real
estate for messages that could be short, direct and more meaningful to your audience. Use
terms that come from the “voice of your customer” – words you can actually hear them using
in sales conversation.
TIP 3: choose words that are meaningful to your customerS

6. Don’t try to impress your audience. Speak to them in words they would use. The more
complex B2B products/services – such as technology solutions – grow, the more complicated
messaging seems to become. In reality, when you explain your product or service in simple
terms, you put yourself in the best possible position to connect with your audience. Don’t try to
impress them with your deep and rich vocabulary. Let the value your product/service delivers
speak for itself.
A simple, straightforward message is one that focuses on the real words your customers use and
the real issues, aspirations and challenges they face. Overly complex, fancy words may sound
impressive … but in the end ... they mean nothing. The truth is, they just get in the way of the real
reason your customers should choose your product/service over the competition.
TIP 3: choose words that are meaningful to your customerS

7. Messaging consistency can take on many forms, all of which can play a role in greater
marketing success.
A survey of 200 marketing and sales leaders showed that 0% saw complete consistency
in their company’s messaging across the customer conversation continuum. In another study,
only 3 percent of respondents said that their company used a repeatable process when creating
content, messages and tools across the enterprise.
So what does this lack of consistency mean? First, that more and more organizations do not
have demand generation processes in place that deliver a clear, consistent message across all
communication channels. It also means that marketers don’t have disciplined processes in place
to develop messaging that leverages consistent input from customer touch points across the
enterprise. As a result, your customer gets a watered-down, fragmented version of your story
when they engage with your brand.
The truth is consistent and persistent messaging management is a must in today’s business world,
and deploying a repeatable process that ensures you maintain a consistent connection with the
“voice of the customer” is an absolute requirement.
So stop re-inventing your story every time a new presentation, brochure or website update is
required. Start investing in a disciplined process grounded in the “voice of the customer” that
allows you to leverage a consistent messaging platform across all communication channels.
Deploying consistent and repeatable processes in these areas will lead to a much improved
customer experience and increased levels of engagement with your target audience.
TIP4:Deliveraconsistentmessagethroughoutthecustomerexperience

8. TIP 5: Create more engaging customer conversations
In Marketing Sherpa’s 2012 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report, CMOs rated multichannel
messaging as the most effective tactic for increasing engagement. The authors of the study go
on to say that “when your targets receive the same message from you via multiple channels, you
create a consistent and engaging experience.”
What does an engaged audience mean to your business? It’s an audience that is saying, “Tell me
more.” It means that your message is initiating conversations with potential customers.
Now more than ever, buyers are able to research products and services online without ever
speaking to a salesperson. This shift to self-service has created a great need for organizations
to develop messaging that engages, educates and convinces prospects to learn more. Here are
a few tips for generating a strong messaging foundation from which you can generate a higher
level of engagement:
• Initiate a messaging development process that starts with a clear, complete
view of your ideal customer. Make sure the value your product/service provides
and the reasons your prospect should believe in that value are based on real insight and
represent the voice of your customer.
• Craft messaging that clearly illustrates and substantiates your key point of
difference. To make your message engaging, you must speak to your prospects in a
way that clearly communicates a new, better, smarter, more effective way of solving a
problem they believe “must” be solved.
• Construct your content development strategy around core messaging
pillars. Generating engaging content that doesn’t tie back to a problem you solve –
with the solution you offer – is simply free advice. Content that is derived from a clear
and compelling messaging foundation, be it a white paper or video, can educate and
engage your audience around a topic that can eventually lead to a sale.
Converting compelling conversations into customers is all about engagement. When your
company takes the time to infuse foundational messages into communication vehicles that span
multiple channels, you’ll generate more conversations … and in time … more customers.

9. About OnMessage
OnMessage is a messaging infusion company with a proven model
for helping organizations develop a clear, compelling and consistent
message. Our methodology aligns your company’s strengths and
true point of difference with customer needs to create a messaging
platform that elicits optimal engagement across all communication
channels. This methodology, when combined with our employee
training programs, sales enablement solutions, and content
marketing services, enables you to achieve the highest return on
every connection and communication investment you make.
For more information
To learn how OnMessage is helping companies change the way
leaders infuse messaging into their company, culture and customers
visit itsonmessage.com.
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© Copyright OnMessage, Inc. 2013 | All rights reserved.