Want a SECRET SAUCE for Your Brand, Business, and Book?

"When you can do a common thing in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world." - George Washington Carver

He was right. If we want to stand out from the crowd, we need to a create an uncommon "secret sauce" that gives us our brand, business, book (and career) a competitive edge.

What's yours?

How are you unlike everyone else? What are your unique skills, talents, offerings?

What do you bring to the table decision-makers want and are willing to pay for - and can't find anywhere else?

Are you thinking, "I know this is important, I just don't know how to do it."

Well, here's an example of how I did it for me and one of my coaching clients - and then I'll share 7 questions that can help you circle in on a one-of-a-kind secret sauce.

Years ago, Dr. Ray Oshiro asked me to present a workshop on conflict resolution for the University of Hawaii.

I called it Dealing with Difficult People Without Becoming One Yourself.

Now, that's a catchy title. It is alliterative and has a beat - which makes it easy to repeat.

However if you Google "difficult people," thousands of entries come up. That meant I would have been competing with all the other experts all addressing the same subject.

That's a prescription for failure, because you can't build a profitable business or a successful career when you're like everyone else.

I knew I needed to keep my antenna up for "uncommon" ways to title and describe this.

I was fortunate in that an encounter in that first workshop for UH resulted in an epiphany that took that topic and my career to a whole new level.

At the first break, a man in the front row didn't even get up to get some fresh air. He just sat there gazing off into space. I was curious so I went over and asked, "What are you thinking?'

He said, "Sam, I'm a real estate broker. I signed up for this seminar because I deal with some very demanding and arrogant people. They seem to think they can treat me any way they want to. I'm tired of it.

I thought you'd teach us some zingers to fire back at people and put them in their place. That's not what this is about, is it?"

I assured him that instead of giving people a piece of our mind, our goal was to give ourselves peace of mind by being able to think on our feet and respond in the moment, instead of thinking of the perfect response on the way home.

He laughed and said, "I'm a student of martial arts. I've studied karate, judo. What you're talking about is almost like a verbal form of kung fu, isn't it?"

My mental lightbulb went off. "You're right, it's kind of like TONGUE FU!"

Eureka. The perfect name for this "martial arts for the mind and mouth" approach to communication and conflict resolution.

Since Tongue Fu! was a NEW word and I was able to show proof of first commercial use, I was able to trademark it. As a result, I was able to:

* Obtain a top literary agent who asked to represent me after hearing my intriguing title.

* Land a lucrative book deal with St. Martin's Press, a major New York publisher.

* Attract big name endorsers including Tony Robbins, John Gray and Jack Canfield.

* Be quoted, reviewed, profiled in Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, New York Times, Readers Digest, Fast Company, Washington Post, Foreign Service Journal.

* Be featured on hundreds of TV and radio shows including Jay Leno's Tonight Show and To Tell the Truth (where our Tongue Fu! team stumped the panel).

* Have my book translated into 17 languages including Chinese, Russian, German, Korean.

* Get paid to speak for hundreds of organizations including Boeing, Capital One, Fortune 500 Forum, Intel, Cisco, ASAE, National Geographic, U.S. Navy, YPO, and Nationwide.

* Certify people around the world who scale the reach and impact of this work in perpetuity.

Why am I telling you this?

Because that would never have happened if I had stuck with a common name.

How about you? Do you have a common name/description of your business, Big Idea, products, services - or do you have a creative name that's giving you a competitive edge?

These questions can kick-start your process for turning a generic positioning and messaging into a genius positioning and messaging that pops you out of your pack.

6 Questions for Creating a Secret Sauce that Gives You a Competitive Edge

1. What is a one-sentence description of who I am, what I have to offer, or my Big Idea?
2. Is it unclear, or is it common and looks and sounds like my competitors?
3. What do I offer than is UNLIKE everyone else in my industry? Where am I dissimilar, different? What do I offer that is contrarian/uncommon, the "opposite of the always?"
4. What do I have to offer that is visionary, first-of-its-kind? Where am I disrupting the norm and ahead of everyone else? What am I introducing that doesn't yet exist?
5. How can I keep my antenna up for how customers, coworkers describe what I do? How am I crowd-sourcing and "getting out of my own head" to be open to fresh approaches?
6. Do I have a name that is metaphorical that an be integrated into my brand name or book title? (Ala Debra Fine and The FINE Art of Small Talk)
7. How am I using POP! techniques (like Alphabetizing) to coin an intriguing name or phrase (e.g., Diabesity, Yappy Hour, Taj Mahalo) that goes viral and becomes a meme?

Want a quick example? Julie Jansen, a career coach, hired me to help her coin a perfect book title. She sighed, "All the great names like 'Take this Job and Love It' are taken."

I asked her, "What is something your clients say all the time?"

She thought about it for a moment and the brightened up, "You know something I hear a lot? I don't know what I want, but I know it's not this!"

I laughed out loud, "Julie, that's your title. People will think, 'That's me!' which means they relate to it and want to buy it. "

Julie's book is still selling years after it was first published because it is timely and timeless.

It's what I call a "Zeitgeist positioning" because it articulates how the target audience feels about something happening RIGHT now that's bothering, frustrating, or concerning them.

How about you? What do your clients or coworkers say to you all the time?

What expresses their zeitgeist? What would cause them to think, "That's me!"

Could you turn that into a unique positioning that helps you pop out of your pack? Could you leverage your name into an easy-to-say, hard-to-forget brand?

Bernadette Peters says, "You gotta be original. Otherwise, what do they need you for?"

If you want to stand out, create an UNCOMMON but NEEDED/WANTED secret sauce and then turn it into an intriguing brand, business and books that helps you break out vs. blend in.

After all, blending in is for Cuisinarts, not for companies, coaches, or marketing campaigns.

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Want more? Check out Sam Horn's coaching services and books POP! Got Your Attention?