I thought about how the Seven P’s apply to branding for small businesses and startups, and I was reminded of our first, now-defunct online venture. We tried to launch an online logo design service for small businesses and startups, but we were in such a rush to get it up that we sort of skipped one of the first steps in building a brand: poke as many holes as you can in your concept.

Most people when launching a business are filled to the brim with excitement and passion, and hole-poking seems like the act of a killjoy who doesn’t believe in the product/service. But hole-poking not only helps you figure out how to position your new brand against competitors, but it also lets you know if there are holes in your concept that can’t be filled (which can save you thousands of dollars and hours). Here are a few hole-poking questions to get you started:

1. Does anyone offer the same feature set as we are proposing?
2. Does anyone in the marketplace already own the position we are contemplating?
3. If we have a better offering, how can we prove it?
4. If we are competing on price, can we survive a price war (and if it’s an online venture, can we compete with others giving away the service for free)?
5. If we have a competitive advantage, is it sustainable? If yes, for how long?
6. Is there an 800-pound gorilla in the market? If yes, what niches don’t they address that we could occupy?

So where does this leave banks and other financial firms in trying to restore both their collective image and their individual identities? First, you’ll probably see a positioning land-grab for attributes like “stable,” “prudent,” “principled” and “safe.” The problem with each of these attributes is twofold: 1) nobody will believe it if it’s only lip service with nothing to back it up, and 2) these things have all been said before by everyone else. All of which makes for poor positioning and lots of firms that all look and sound the same. Just like before everything went in the tank.

What will the smart financial firms do to differentiate themselves from the pack? For starters, they will clear the “integrity” hurdle, which they can do in two ways. 1) By compensating their management in a sensible manner (Seth Godin just wrote a fantastic blog entry about how the obscene salaries of megabank CEOs are an expensive and ineffective method by which these companies have tried to differentiate themselves). 2) By providing as complete transparency as possible so their customers and investors can clearly and easily see what is on their books (this should be done voluntarily and in excess of whatever new government regulations are adopted).

Then they will muster up the willpower that many banks and financial firms lack and move beyond bland attributes like “stable” and “safe” and “responsive” and “friendly,” embracing specific, ownable attributes. Like “fast commercial loans for deserving businesses.” Or “the bank for farmers.” Or “Denver’s neighborhood bank.” Or “the 401(k) specialist for institutions.”

Now is a time when people need and want to know what their bank and financial firm stands for. Let them know before they walk away forever.

All too often people come to us with the complaint that if they could just break through the clutter, come up with the right marketing angle, say the right thing, then their business or product would take off.

After a few minutes of discussion, we quickly discover that their business does the exact same thing that dozens of other businesses do. In business, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing everyone else is doing and expecting a different result.

Case in point … say you open a new pizzeria. Even small towns already have several who have been in business much longer than you and have loyal clientele, and in big cities your competitive landscape is an even larger . So whatever pizza you will make – deep dish, NY style, gourmet cracker crust – somebody else is already doing it. So why should you expect people to gravitate to your shop when your product is the same, and why would you expect them to change from eating at their old pizza haunts (remember, people hate change)?

Your problem here isn’t a marketing problem; it’s a product problem. So what do you do? Change the product and change your positioning. Make triangular pies. Deliver it in triangular boxes. Specialize in gluten-free pizzas. Create an unconventional theme for your shop. In other words, do something to differentiate yourself, to make your product something that people want to try (and then to try again). It’s a bold step, but it beats being out of business.

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