Stop what you’re doing and grab a pen (or keyboard), because I’m about to take you through a powerful exercise that will improve you marketing immensely. There are only two steps, and this should not take more than 10 minutes, but if you follow these instructions, you will immediately and dramatically improve your marketing. I conduct this exercise privately with clients and publicly with audiences, and it yields powerful results every time. So, are you with me?

Ready?

Here’s Step One: List the top* three ways your product or service improves people’s lives, work, or companies.

* Top = best, most dramatic, most immediate, longest lasting, most exciting, most compelling, most surprising. The items on your list do not need to meet all of these obligations, but every item on your list should meet at least one of these criteria.

Your list should be made up of real-life results and value, and should address these one or more of these areas:

• Time
• Revenue / Sales
• Family
• Home
• Productivity
• Results
• Effectiveness

You get the idea: We’re looking for how your product or service improves customers and not the ways in which it does so. I don’t care about your technical specification or functionality, but I care very much about the improvements your functionality creates.

Got your list? It doesn’t have to be perfect. We’re looking for progress, not perfection. And you can always make changes later. If you have your list, here’s the next and final step:

Step Two: For each of your three major results items, write three messaging points centered on emotion and lifestyle.

How do you add emotion? By adding adjectives to messaging that addresses areas that matter to your market.

Some examples: 

For an anti-virus company: 

Life-improvement statement: Protecting  you and your family from viruses and hackers.

Messaging Point: We are powerful insurance for you and your family, dramatically increasing your productivity and peace-of-mind, while protecting you from people and programs that have no business on your home computer.

Note: Powerful…dramatically…you and your family…protecting. It’s an emotional messaging point, done in one sentence that never mentions viruses, hackers, software, malware, trojans or other technical items.

For a social media consultant: 

Client-improvement statement: I increase your sales by improving your marketing effectiveness.

Messaging Point: I automate direct communication between you and your market. This incredibly valuable connection lets you announce your new products or services to the world by connecting you to thousands of your customers and prospective customers. It’s not marketing, it’s relationships, which are infinitely more effective.

Note: Automate…direct…incredibly valuable…connecting…thousands of your customers…relationships…infinitely more effective. Not one mention of Facebook, Twitter, or Google+.

Three messaging points like this is enough, as it will arm you with everything you need to conquer your market. Why? Because your competition is not marketing like this. It’s not a difficult crowd to stand out in, but if you do this, you’ll stand head-and-shoulders above your market.

My new book, Evangelist Marketing: What Apple, Amazon, and Netflix Understand About Their Customers (That Your Company Probably Doesn’t) was published in January. It’s 288 pages on topics like this one. 

My Web site details my work.