Your Brand Is Your Best Business Strategy Part 2

All of the best laid business plans are worth nothing if they aren’t built on the foundation of your brand.

It’s absolutely essential that you know who you are and the values you bring to the table.

Many entrepreneurs will come up with a business plan, define their mission, vision, and values and call it a day. From that point on, they’ll get stuck in the weeds of the business and often stray from what they set out to accomplish in the first place.

In today’s world, that’s not enough. Consumers do more research, have access to more options, and make at a minimum 70% of their buying decision before they’ve ever gotten on a phone call with you.

How do they get to that point? They look at your online presence. They read your content and watch your videos. They look at reviews and ask their friends if they have heard anything.

Having this in mind, it’s critical that you not only define your mission, vision, and values, but that you live and breathe those things; that you hire and fire by your values and not just on skill alone. Because if you don’t, people will sniff it out quite quickly.

The messaging you curate for your website and social media needs to speak to your audience intentionally.

You’ve got to be able to address their pain points and share how your business solves them. But even deeper than that, you need to dig down deep and figure out what’s underneath those surface level concerns.

That’s where you show you are different.

That’s where you help your audience realize your business is the only one they want to work with.

So how do we find your audience? How do we create that intentional draw to you and your business? Download my free DIY brand audit to get started.

*** If you haven’t downloaded the free DIY branding audit stop reading here. If you have, and you feel like you want more information to understand what’s next, keep reading.

Branding agency versus branding coach

Oftentimes the difference between the two may feel almost indistinguishable. However, when you dig beneath the surface, you are going to find they are actually quite different. It’s rare you’ll find a branding agency who has one person dedicated completely to you. There are many people involved in your rebranding process which can lead to miscommunication, delayed turn-around time on your project, and the need for you to repeat yourself, sharing the information multiple times with multiple people.

Branding agencies also often water down the strategy piece of your brand, to get right to the design and visual identity (which is what people often initially feel the most excited about).  While that’s fun and you get to see your brand come to life, when the strategy is lacking, the visual identity will not reflect you and your business in the best way it could. You’ll be left with something pretty that doesn’t have a whole lot of substance.

Now, not all branding agencies are created equal. I’m part of a collective that specializes in branding and the reason I do work for them is because their process is quite thorough and values aligned for me. However, these types of agencies who place the proper emphasis on strategy are few and far between.

When you work with a branding coach, you are getting one person who is deeply dedicated to seeing your brand and business passionately and audaciously represented in the marketplace.

Brand coaches aren’t confined to the traditional methodologies branding agencies follow. Your coach thinks about you as a unique individual and determines the proper strategy based on you specifically.

Because branding coaches are so picky about who they work with, they’ll help you get hyper focused too. They know the importance of really digging deep and determining what makes you and your business so different from everyone else.

Here’s an example. I know my clients, regardless of industry, hold these things in common:

-don’t take life too seriously

-aren’t pretentious

-salt of the earth people

-good people

-know who they are and are comfortable with it (they just aren’t sure their brand reflects it)

-accepting

-believe humans need to be treated like humans

-want the audacity to show up in an authentic way that brings in their ideal client

Notice how specific those things are?

That’s because I care deeply about my clients and making sure they know I reflect all those qualities as well. I know that if a potential client approaches me and they have all these qualities, we’ll be able to work together quite well. I know I’ll be able to give them a brand strategy and identity they are proud of and that will draw in the right people for their business.

As a branding coach, not bound to an agency, I can take the time I need to get to the depths of who you and your business are. It’s sort of like therapy for your business.

*disclaimer, I am not a licensed therapist though if given the chance to go back, I think I could make a pretty good one 🙂

We’ll work together to help you understand your true vision and values. We’ll define a brand and create a strategy that makes sense of the muddled mess in your brain. We’ll sift through it all and build something you are proud of, making it crystal clear who you are, who your ideal audience is, how you plan to help them, and what you need to say so they understand the unique value you bring to them.

We laugh together. We might even cry together (or at least get a little misty eyed). We’ll channel the tenacity and hard-working helper energy of my Grandma (*read part 1 if you don't get this reference) and work together to create something you love.

What do you think? Does that sound like something you are ready for? And more importantly, does it sound like something you need?

Send me a message or fill out the contact form on my website and we’ll set up a time to chat. Let’s see if we are a good fit for one another.