One of the greatest challenges every small business faces is getting the prospect to pay attention to how they are different.

It may not actually be true, but until you prove otherwise, in the mind of the market, one accountant is like another, one electrician like another, one print shop like another.

Creating and communicating your core difference through an effective marketing strategy is the tact I suggest, but you can give your core message a boost with a simple branding tactic I like to employ.

Think about the processes you use in your business to effectively deliver results to your clients and start giving them names. It may seem a little silly to you at first, but when you give your process to ensure accuracy on a tax return a name – 20 Point Triple Guarantee Accuracy process, it becomes more tangible to the prospect.

You don’t have to stop at service processes, you can include marketing and promotion processes too. Your sales call could become a 7 Point Needs Analysis and your annual sale could become “SNIAGRAB.” (That’s bargains spelled backwards and is in fact the marketing work of outdoor retailer GartSports.)

Naming and documenting your success systems offers a prospect proof that you do indeed have a system, you follow steps that assure results. In many instances you can communicate how much more valuable your process is by simply showing them that it is more complicated than you make it look and that you actually do much more for them than they ever knew.

Naming every system and process that is client focused has another really valuable benefit – it makes the process seem more official to your people and will require you to document the actual steps in the system – something you really should do anyway.