As a salesperson you want to become a superstar in the marketplace. In order to do that, you must follow one essential guideline to establish yourself as different from your competition: brand yourself.

You want customers and prospects to recognize you as the one salesperson in your market they should contact. It is fine to be associated with a well-regarded company, but you need to have your own identity as the salesperson that provides value to his or her customers. More salespeople have chosen to refer to themselves as advisers? or consultants? as one branding strategy. When we launched the company, we developed an identity as a customer service-oriented lender that provided affordable mortgages at discounted rates,? a branding that we have continued.

My own branding evolved as customers and prospects began to recognize me as the nation?s top ranked loan originator. Be sure to avoid branding yourself too narrowly. For instance, developing a reputation as ?The First-time Homeowner’s Realtor,? will substantially reduce your customer base, unless you prefer to only work with new homeowners. Many loan originators who nurtured a ?subprime specialist? brand were unable to distance themselves from that unpopular title once the lending industry?s crisis unfolded.

If you brand yourself creatively amongst your primary competition, you are one step closer to becoming the sales leader in your marketplace and reaching your sales goals.

Daniel Milstein is the bestselling author of ABC of Sales. For more information, visit: http://amzn.to/ABCARTICLES.