Marketing wisdom tells us that the focus of your marketing should be on your potential clients.

But YOU are a central part of your business and your clients want to relate to you too, beyond what you can do for them.

• What is it about you that will connect with and inspire the people you'd like to work with?
• What is it about your persona that creates the image of your business?

One way to start getting your arms around this is to define the three words that give your business its personality AND are also an integral part of who you are.

The three words encompass things like:

• How do you make your clients feel?
• What do they think of when they think of you?
• What makes you stand out for them? (Or do you blend into the background and remain forgettable?)
• What attitudes permeate your life?
• What values are important to you and that your ideal clients relate to?

Once you've defined your three words, you can use them in every part of your business, with designers, sales people, employees, your clients, when networking and giving talks, so that you are always presenting a consistent image of yourself that's true to who you really are.

Here are some examples of businesses whose three words do a great job of summing up who they are:

• Trader Joe's: fun, friendly, helpful. If you look at how their "Fearless Flyer" is written, the signage in their stores, and how the employees treat you, it's clear how these three words are reflected in what they do and how they do it.
• Apple computers: innovation, design, imagination. Enough said!
• The pop group "The Sex Pistols": rude, obnoxious, anarchist. That's who they are and that's how they present themselves. That's why people like them or don't like them. They're smart enough to know that their style won't appeal to everyone and with that kind of branding, it looks as if they don't want it to!

In each case, the three words are a conscious part of the image those companies present. They may not use those exact words in their promotions, but underneath, everything they do is infused with them.

Your three words make your business human to your clients and gives them something to hold on to.

Even better, the words will energize YOU. You can focus your energy around creating this image so your business is energized too.

What are YOUR three words?

They may not be as obvious as they appear.

If someone asked me what three words describe me, I'll probably say "creative, adventurous, talkative."

Do my clients care about those words? Not a bit!

I had to do some deep digging to find the words that are me AND are relevant to my clients.

But it was worth it.

When you find your three words, your image and your message will be that much more appealing to your ideal clients and those people will resonate with you. They'll understand that YOU are the right person for them.

And those are the kinds of clients you want to attract: the ones who know you can help them, but who also connect more deeply with you because of the image you project in everything you say and do. And that's one key to getting good clients.

It can be scary to get into this. You can get "word anxiety."

If you need help, I have a module that helps you get your arms around this information in detail. If you want to chat about this, give me a call at 805 965 9173 or email me at Maggie@MyMarketingMessage.com.

Copyright 2015 Maggie Dennison