No matter what business you are in, there is always going to be competition. Distinguishing your brand from all the others is key to building sales, capturing market share, and building loyalty among clients and customers.

Your brand’s ‘Unique Selling Point’, or USP, is how you stand out from the competition. Defining your USP and exploiting its potential offers a long-term path to continued successful branding. Here’s how you do it.

USP as Branding

First, it’s important to understand that your brand’s USP is more than just marketing. It is what defines your business as a whole, including everything from operations to product design to choice of marketing platforms and targeted customers.

Second, as the name implies your Unique Selling Point should be the one thing that distinguishes your business from all the others in the same marketplace. It’s not a product feature, it’s a branding concept. For example, the USP of Apple’s iPhones isn’t that they are compact, intuitive to use, or even that they are smart. It’s that they are innovative and cool.

By defining this particular USP, Apple is able to convince millions of consumers worldwide to pay more for their product even though there are others that do essentially the same thing for less money. And this central USP is integrated into everything from packaging to their research and development to the design of their retail stores.

What’s Your USP?

So defining the USP for your brand, products, and business as a whole probably the single most important decision you will make as a business owner. You want a USP that is true, concise, and easy for customers to instantly grasp. Yet it also should be bold, edgy, and focused squarely on customer benefit.

Lytron Design can help you define your brand’s USP then collaborate with you to implement it across all platforms as part of an overall strategic branding campaign. Let’s work together to create a memorable, effective USP that will give you the results you want.

The key to any long-term business relationship is value. When what you offer is valuable to your clients or customers — whether it is a product, a service, or simply an idea — then that value creates a strong loyalty that you can benefit from for years or even decades.

But in today’s lightning-fast, scroll-through business environment in which attention spans are shorter than ever, value is not enough. Your business also needs to engage your clients in ways that are simultaneously unique and appealing.

Standing Out from the Crowd

The benefit of offering a product/service/idea that is unique in your marketplace is nothing new. The big business schools have been instilling this idea in their graduates for generations.

What is different in today’s business environment is the need to engage people in ways that are appealing. It’s not enough to have a website that offers high-value content or simple and efficient navigation. Web pages also need to appeal to the eye, inspire the intellect, and instill confidence and comfort in both casual and repeat visitors.

The same premise holds true for every other potential contact portal for customers or clients, including print media, broadcast marketing, and even physical showrooms and offices. There’s simply too much competition today to allow your focus to slip even slightly. By the time you realize you have lost the customer’s attention, 15 other competitors will be vying for their business.

Building Brand Loyalty

Engaging people in ways that are continually creative and effective is hard. If everybody could do it, we would all be billionaires. But the good news is once you land upon brand identity for your business that is both unique and appealing, you can create strong loyalties that will keep people coming back to you time and time again.

Apple has done it. So has Tesla, Netflix, Costco, and countless others. Now it’s your turn. If you’re ready to get started, Lytron Design is ready to help.

The restaurant industry in Florida currently is facing the biggest challenge in its history. Restrictions and closures caused by the COVID-19 global pandemic have created an existential crisis for restaurants in every city and town in the state. Many already have closed while others are teetering on the brink of insolvency.

Those that survive will have to navigate a minefield of local, state, and national regulations. They also will need to find new and innovative ways to reassure customers that their dining rooms are safe, their employees are healthy, and the quality of the food and experience has been uncompromised. And this unique dilemma applies to both chains and independent restaurants alike.

Brand Strategy

Branding could hold the key to survival. Developing, implementing, and promoting a successful brand strategy can address these immediate concerns while setting the stage for future growth and continued success.

In addition to making it through the next several months, those restaurants that hope to survive need to reassure customers on every level — from their personal safety to the uniqueness of their offering to the unsurpassed quality of the dining experience. And one of the most effective ways to do that is to partner with an experienced, proven brand strategy company like Lytron Design.

Brand Message and Voice

Lytron Design can work with your restaurant team to develop the kind of unique and effective brand message and voice that brings customers back time and time again. Our experienced, professional brand strategists can help your brand build trust and loyalty among current customers while appealing to an ever-expanding pool of new diners.

Incorporating your restaurant’s distinct offerings and highlighting your specific values, we can show you how to make the most out of what you do best while inviting people into your restaurant so they can have a memorably delightful experience in a safe and reassuring environment.

Brand Design

The brand strategy team at Lytron Design will then implement your branding into every element of your operation — from your marketing to your signage, social media to scripting, SEO to menu design, and more.

These are the toughest of all times for restaurants. Help ensure your business not only survives, but thrives today, tomorrow, and beyond with effective, professional, and results-driven brand strategy from the experts at Lytron Design.

You may have heard the term “archetypes” before. Or maybe not. But they are critically important to the success of your business.

Why? Because archetypes define psychological mind states that customers have when looking for products, services, and businesses.

People make “buy or don’t buy decisions” based on emotions and feelings. Archetypes are simply ways of expressing a set of emotions that instantly attract a certain type of customer.

Tap into the one that best defines your brand and you can successfully attract more customers, better clients, and people who are ready to BUY RIGHT NOW.

Okay, this is a lot. But it will become clearer when I describe the 12 brand archetypes and the demand triggers they execute in the right customer:

The Amazing Magician

• You can make the impossible possible
• People connect on a spiritual level with your brand
• Customers are attracted to your personal style and actions

The Magician/Alchemist/Healer archetype is appealing to people who want fast, dramatic change. A brand example would be Apple.

The Ordinary Everyman

• You seem like the guy or girl next door
• You offer people a connection to a community of like-thinking individuals
• Customers feel like they understand and share your viewpoint

The Everyman appeals to customers who strive to be understood and appreciated. The perfect brand example would be Wal-Mart.

The Iconoclast

• You aren’t afraid to tell it like it is
• You don’t have a lot of patience for fools
• You speak from a position of authority … and have the credentials to back it up!

The Rebel/Iconoclast appeals to people who aren’t satisfied with the way the world is and want to change it in their image. A great brand example would be Harley-Davidson.

The Wise Teacher

• You freely share knowledge
• You are passionate about keeping people informed
• Customers admire your intellect and opinions

People who are attracted to the Sage/Mentor/Teacher value wisdom above all else. Brand examples would include The Wall Street Journal.

The Brave Explorer

• You have the courage to boldly go where nobody else has gone before
• You invite people think of themselves in a new and exciting way
• Customers want to be like you

The Explorer/Guide/Seeker archetype appeals to people who are passionate about experience life first-hand. A brand example would be The North Face.

The Entertainer

• You are skilled at making people laugh to forget their problems
• You show people how to enjoy and appreciate the now rather than worrying about later
• Customers love to be around you

The Entertainer/Performer/Comedian appeals to people who like to have fun. A brand example would be Old Spice.

The General

• You get the job done on time, within budget, and above expectations
• You cut through the static and get right to the point to deliver success
• People feel willing to ignore distractions and trust in your proven abilities

The General offers customers seriousness and significance. A brand example would be BMW.

The Lover

• Following the heart is more important than thinking too much
• You forgive people for giving into temptations and desire
• People feel a strong emotional connection to you

The Lover/Caring Friend appeals to customers who value passion over logic. A terrific brand example would be Haagen-Dazs.

The Loving Mother

• You are reliable, caring, and emotionally available
• You give without worrying about receiving anything back in return
• People are impressed with your ability to serve

The Caregiver/Servant/Mother appeals to people who want to be cared for. A brand example would be the American Red Cross.

The Fierce Warrior

• You can achieve amazing goals even when they seem insurmountable
• You offer people toughness combined with keen intellect
• Customers feel like you will inspire them to be responsible

The Hero/Warrior/Protector appeals to customers who want to achieve specific goals or outcomes. A great brand example would be Nike.

The Innocent

• You remind people of when times were simpler
• You exude optimism and hope
• People are attracted to the purity of your beliefs

The Innocent appeals to customers who want to simplify their lives. A brand example would be Coca-Cola.

The Innovative Creator

• You have the ability to show people something new and exciting that they never could have imagined on their own
• You teach people a craft they can use to improve their own creativity
• People want to be around you because they feel inspired by your vision

The Innovative Creator appeals to people who want to believe in something bigger than themselves. The best brand example would be LEGO.

So which archetype best describes you?

Every brand is unique. But the approach Lytron  takes to helping clients discover and understand their specific brand follows a predictable pattern.

Here is the step-by-step branding process we use to create flourishing, successful brands for our clients. While there are many variables – after all, your brand is distinctly about you! – the strategy is proven to be successful.

Step 1 – Connecting with Our Clients

In order to understand your brand, the branding professionals at Lytron  have to understand you. What makes you tick? What do you want out of your business? What do YOU see as your road to success.

Getting to know our clients is the first and – arguably – most important step in the collaborative process of crafting your unique brand. Generally, we begin with a 15- to 20-minute phone call in which we get to know each other and gain an understanding of how we can help each other successful achieve your specific objectives.

Step 2 – Let’s Talk about Brand Design

After our discovery call, it’s time to start thinking visually. How do you envision your brand “looking” like?

We often encourage our clients to visually brainstorm in one of a number of ways:

• Creating a vision board that builds a roadmap to what your specific version of success looks like
• Building a Pinterest page with brand design you like
• Filling out a questionnaire that includes answers that help us navigate your brand to where you genuinely want it to be
• Participating in a 60- to 90-minute Skype chat to get “down and dirty” into branding strategies, ideas, and concepts.

By the end of all this prep work, the Lytron  team generally has everything it needs to get going on your unique and successful branding for your business.

Step 3 – Defining Brand Assets

The next step is identifying the special features of your brand that make it unique. These can include specific products or services but also things like your personality, your company culture, and even your aspirations and hopes for the future.

You define your business by focusing on what makes it unique and identifying the factors that will make prospective customers and clients choose it from among all the other competitors.

Step 4 – Brand Building

The next step is truly magical. Combining our expertise with your passion for your business, Lytron  collaboratively creates a unique and consistent branding strategy for your business.

This can take a variety of forms including everything from logo design, marketing strategies, blog and social media posts, and everything in between.

While the basic steps tend to be universal, where they take us together is always magical. And at Lytron , we can’t wait to get started on our journey together with your business!