What’s your secret ingredient
How to uncover your strengths and set yourself apart
Hello and welcome to The Curious Marketer,
If you haven’t already please pop in and introduce yourself here. As I build this small community of female founders, solopreneurs and entrepreneurs. My hope is to create a space where we can learn, grow and share some of the challenges of going it alone.
It’s no secret that we’re living in a time where there’s more competition for our attention than ever. The average person sees between 4,000 and 10,000 marketing messages each day, so how can you hope to stand out.
There are many factors to consider when creating a brand that stands out from every other brand and message, but first, consider how you stand out amongst your competitors. What’s your secret ingredient? What makes you, you?
Understanding what makes you and your business different begins with defining your strengths. What are the skills and passions you’ve tapped into time and again? What are the themes that keep cropping up? I did this as I was deciding what I wanted to do next and when I was starting to shape The Curious Marketer brand strategy. It gave me a series of unique selling propositions that I could use in my messaging. Most importantly, it gave me stories to tell.
It’s also important to do this exercise if you’ve got a product-based business but how you approach it is a little different. Understanding how your brand and product stand out from your competitors makes for compelling messaging.
Here’s a quick exercise to help you find out your secret ingredients.
The Curious Marketer started with some deep self-discovery. I went through this exercise well before I had the idea. I wanted to understand what I was good at and most importantly what I enjoyed doing. So I could build a business that allowed me to do what I love and use my strengths to help other founders to do what they love too.
Start by asking yourself these questions.
1. What jobs have I had and what did they teach me? - not so much job titles but learning experiences
2. What have I studied that I found interesting or inspiring or came naturally to me? – doesn’t have to be a formal qualification just something that’s captured your curiosity
3. What other major experiences have I had? – have you travelled or lived in another country? Learnt something new, had a family, built a house?
4. Who has had a major influence and what did they teach you?
Now take a large piece of paper and map these things over time from left to right. Make a note at any point that was a ‘pivotal’ moment and draw lines between things that are connected. For example something that happened because of something else you did.
Now think of 5-6 words that describe the kind of person you are based on the experiences you’ve had, and the road you’ve travelled to here. These are your strengths, your secret ingredients, those things that make you, you.
My secret ingredients
I used the exercise above along with a lot of other work to uncover my strengths, my secret ingredients. These helped me shape my business, and I use these to guide my messaging and set myself apart.
Curiosity – I love asking questions understanding what’s really going on. I love exploring new ideas and travelling to and living in new places. This has been a theme throughout my life and work. I’ve lived in 3 different countries and made a career of understanding people, what they want and how they think.
Creativity – Taking chances and creating things that never existed before. I remember as a child making mini magazines. Just over a year ago I started my Substack
my grown up version! I’ve also taken this into my career creating marketing strategies and writing content.Problem solving – Understanding what’s not working and why, then developing strategies to change things for the better. Life always has its ups and downs meaning there’s always a problem to solve and business is no different. I’ve spent 16 years solving problems for businesses across the world through marketing.
Storytelling - I loved books and reading for as long as I can remember. I’ve studied English literature and have always loved to write. I love being around writers and I love learning and developing my craft. Every morning before I start my day I spend an hour writing with 200 other writers from around the world with The London Writers Salon So helping other people to tell their stories through their content and enabling them to connect with their clients and customers is one of my strengths.
I’d love to know your secret ingredients. If you want to share please do so in the comments.
You’re busy, I get it. That’s why I’ve wrapped up the most important posts of the week right here so you can catch up without having to get caught up in the scroll.
This post on Guidance for April content planning
This post on How marketing can increase your luck surface area
This post on How I can support you in April
This blog all about building a personal brand that feels like you
This is where I share the books, podcasts and articles that I think will inspire.
This interesting piece on The end of ‘Brand’ me
Sometime you just need to dump the to do list and run. Here’s all the permission you need in Permission to dump the to-do list and run! On
This piece on finding your confidence This is not the confidence you’re looking for on
This brilliant piece from
on Rhythm makes good writingAs a founder and small business owner it’s important to engage in real rest. I wrote this piece about the challenges of learning how to rest.
If you’re curious…
I’m Rebecca, the writer of this newsletter. I’m a marketing consultant and content and copywriter for female founded small businesses.
Thank you for sharing my link. I am a big fan of understanding your strengths. I work with clients on strengths a lot. Having that understanding of what you do with ease and enjoy - your strengths - is so important. And so often clients feel a sense of validation when their strength assessment tells them what they've known! I know I felt that myself, the first time I did an assessment.