Brandiing your Business

7/29/2019 Brandiing your Business

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Start Immediately

Failingto start on your branding on Day One is one of the biggest mistakes that you can pos-

sibly make.

This is why in this chapter, Ill tell you about the easiest way toget startedon building your

brand. However, this chapter is not about every single branding activity or decision you

need to make - its only about the start.

Therefore, theres really no reason for you not to start right away.

Get Started on Branding

The other day, I just saw this highly relevant quote:

Start even before you feel ready.

Im sharing this to you because this quote mirrors my thoughts on branding as well.

Strangely, though, this quote contradicts whats actually happening in the general market-

place.

At the moment, it seems like branding is always just an after-thought. A startup decides on

a name, decides on a logo and then considers Branding: Phase 1 as done. The startupthen focuses on building its product, hiring its team and acquiring its customers - ulti-

mately leaving branding as something to be dealt with later on.

This kind of strategy is not my approach.

Branding is important - its probably more importantthan many of the other things you

need to work on in your business.

Start thinking about your branding immediately. Prioritize your branding, especially on DayOne.

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Begin with Self-Awareness

As a brand enthusiast, Im often asked about the best way to create, build and establish a

new brand.

Almost 99% of the time, though, my answer isnt to re-think your visual branding at all - its

to take a step back and work on your personal self-awareness instead.

Start with self-awareness. This is because you need to establish your own identitybefore

even thinking about establishing your own brand.

Remember thatyou are your own brand.

In the same way that the lead vocalist of a band gets most of the attention, as your com-

panys founding entrepreneur,you influence your brand the most. The way you think, the

way you work and the overall way you represent yourself ultimately become your brands

core characteristics.

Your brand and your professional endeavors represent who you are and how you want to

be seen.

The best way to build an effective brand is for you to work on what youre passionate

about.

In the short term, it is possible to trick your brain and heart into doing something you

dont really want to do

But, in the long term, this strategy wont work. Instead, youll find your work ethic (and suc-

cessful execution) dithering if you continue pursuing something you dont feel strongly

about.

The great irony is its easier to lie to yourself than it is to lie to others - people around you

can sense when youre really passionate about something. Conversely, these people can

sense when youre not.

Why is your personal passion important in your professional brand?

When you love what you do, its easier for you to stick to doing it.

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In the 10,000-hour rule, it takes 10,000 hours for you to be an expert in yourfield.

When you love your core business, its faster for you to excel in it.

When youre in love with yourfield, its easier for you to talk about it and for your cus-

tomers to listen to you.

Being passionate about your brand helps you establish your brands own unique identity.

Youre unique; therefore, your business brand is unique.

Take the example of Gary Vaynerchuk. Gary created Wine Library TV to great success be-

cause he was passionate about what he was communicating!

That exuberance - yes, the shouting, profanity and everything else - is the reason why peo-

ple tuned in to hear Gary speak about wine. Im 100% sure that Gary could have paid the

most renowned wine connoisseur in the world who couldhave delivered better, more ac-

curate and factual content. But if Gary did that, then, it wouldve lacked the intense pas-

sion that Gary had used to communicate his brands unique message.

If the expert he hired wasnt passionate enough, his business would have been just an-

other plain old wine business.

You wouldnt like your business to be considered onlyaverage, right? No! You would like

your business to be at the top!

In order to be at the top, you have to be emotionally positive about whatyourbrand has

to say. Your brand is supposed to be personalized according to you!

Be self-aware and brand the wayyou think. Like Gary, brand your business according to

your passion & personality.

In the same vein, this is exactly why Im personally writing this book. Im incredibly passion-

ate about branding - I believe that my success in branding (both myself and in

WooThemes) has been one of the primary drivers to my personal achievements.

Ask me any question about branding and youll find me talking for ages: my thoughts, opin-

ions and experiences about branding are all part of who I am.

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On the contrary, ask me to present a course on financial accounting (which I almost failed

at University) and youll likely be sitting through this book while wanting to cut offyour

ears. :)

Do you get the distinction here? Having passion and personality sets you apart from the

rest. Its the difference between blah brands and boom yeah! brands.

Branding is Personal

In business, most things are neverjust business. Every decision, every strategy and every

action are all individually personalized: an individual with opinions, preferences, and predis-

positions significantly influences a companys direction.

Branding is no different. You, as an individual, need to control your companys direction by

being involved during the whole branding process.

To easily build your brand, you need to accept the fact that a symbiosis between yourself

and your brand exists. All of your good characteristics, and the not-so-good ones, will be

moved over to your brand. (Naturally, these characteristics will all be dealt with accord-

ingly.)

You are your brand.

If you were an outsider, wouldyou listen to yourself talk about your brand?

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Understand the Good Brand

Characteristics

Youve already known the importance of passion and youve already figured out whatyoure passionate in.

The next part is enumerating your personal traits.

You need to have the appropriate personal characteristics to get started.

A Simple Success Formula

Passion + Personality + Perseverance = Profi

t

To achieve a successful brand, the next step is to: pinpoint your personal characteristics

that influence the professional values of your brand.

Think of this as Self-Awareness 2.0!

Socrates did advocate that we Know thyself first.

Our wisdom starts with our knowledge of ourselves.

To give you a better understanding of this, lets do some quick case studies.

Lets take a look at a few well-known technology companies and their brands message

about their founders. Here, were going to determine 1 - 2 primary brand characteristics

just by adapting an outsiders view of the companiess brand identities.

Looking at 37Signals, I see their ruthless minimalism in their execution and I also see

their incredible passion and intense opinion about the way they work.

MailChimp is all about having fun and making a really mundane task (sending e-mails)

easy and enjoyable.

On the other end, KissMetrics communicates that theyre serious, analytic and pas-

sionate about helping other businesses succeed.

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I love Zappos because its blatantly obvious that their #1 priority is delighting their

customers. Their brand assures me that Ill be their #1 priority if I were to do busi-

ness with them.

With WooThemes, weve sculpted a quirky and progressive brand where we communi-

cate our transparency about mistakes and our process of learning from these mis-

takes.

Upon looking at these brands, we can summarize that:

37Signals: Minimalist, Opinionated

MailChimp: Fun, Easy

KissMetrics: Logical, Helpful

Zappos: Happy, Compassionate

WooThemes: Quirky, Transparent

Youll see that just by looking at five different brands, we were able to see radically different

characteristics that emerged.

These characteristics dont follow any consistent trends. In fact, these brands didnt even

adapt any secret formula at all. Yet, all of these companies have been immensely success-

ful at what they do!

Why?

This is because the brand characteristics weve enumerated are majorly influenced by the

unique personalities of each brands founding entrepreneurs!

Note that there are certain characteristics that are more optimal than others - however, a

less optimal characteristic doesnt necessarily mean its a wrong one.

Theres really no real right or wrong in terms of what would make good brand characteris-

tics. No fixed black or white area exists - every characteristic can be optimal according to

its application.

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For example, Im a very impatient person. This is a bad thing in itself, right? But, being impa-

tient is actually considered optimal in my case. This bad characteristic fuels my impulsive-

ness and work ethics (because I cant sit still and do nothing). As a result, being impatient

greatly influenced majority of my success.

Being impatient seemed detrimental at first. But because I applied it appropriately to my

branding, this seemingly negative characteristic produced positive results!

Successful branding is whatyou do, not what you say. Its about what you deliverto your

customers.

Consider our above examples - yes, they tellpeople all about their brand characteristics.

But, if what they say and what they do dont match up, do you think people would still do

business with them?

In the end, you can promise all you want. But, if what youre delivering to your customers

is contradictory to what youre promising, your brand will be just meaningless.

For WooThemes, while our brand is quirky, we always tread a veryfine line between being

quirky and being slightly sarcastic. We differentiate between these through our actual cus-

tomer service!

We make it an eff

ort to use our quirkiness to help our customers solve their problems.

We dont just promise to help - we also actually do the hard work too.

Going back to understanding good brand characteristics, keep in mind that successful

branding is about being honestabout who you are and about accepting your imperfections

for what they are.

This is why knowing thyselffirst is crucial. If you can convert your bad characteristic

and apply it positively to your branding, youre welcome to experiment!

Invest time in exploring your personal characteristics. No ones going to judge you! ;)

Successful branding is communicating who you are to your customers by influencingyour

professional brand with your personal characteristics.

Expose what your brand is by exposing who you arefirst.

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Define Who You Are

Earlier, we analyzed other established brands first. This is because according to the Social

Cognitive Theory, people learn knowledge and behaviors through the initial observation of

others.

Its advocated that your survival depends on your ability to replicate others actions. In the

brand-building context, you initially learned by identifying with ideal brands before identi-

fying with yourselves.

After analyzing these ideal brands, youll now be learning about your real selves to build

your real brands.

Substantiate the process of self-awareness by definingyourunique personality. After all,

your brand is the product of all your hard work & resources - its technically your baby!

In the same way that the baby will usually inherit his parents characteristics, your brand

will inherit your personality as well!

Because your brands foundation is built according to you (your characteristics, your val-

ues and your beliefs), we need to focus on you.

Who are you?

What parts of your personality are unique and influential to your professional brand?

To give you a clearer understanding of this, I would advise you to make two lists:

1. In the 1st list, enumerate 10 of your personal characteristics or values. Be honest. :)

2. In the second list, take those 10 characteristics / values youve enumerated and re-

package them into your brands identity.

Ill go first, then? Ill enumerate my personal characteristics and re-package them into Pub-

licBetas brand identity, for your guidance.

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My Personal Characteristics / Values

Im a dreamer.

Im passionate about helping other people.

I dont make excuses for myself.

I want to learn something new every day.

I believe in finding a work-life balance that works for me.

Im a unique individual.

I wear my heart on my sleeve.

I learn from mistakes and I like sharing those experiences.

When I work, I work hard.

Im impulsive.

Notice that most of these statements start with the words I amor I.

Its fine for your list to start with I! In fact, every item on your list shouldstart with I be-

cause thefi

rst list is about who you really are!

Now, lets go to step 2 and re-package these personality traits of mine into PublicBetas

brand:

PublicBetas Characteristics

(Note: Since PublicBeta is obviously not an established brand just yet, some of these characteris-

tics might not be very obvious - for now. Well talk about communication of brand characteris-

tics later on.)

Im re-packaging every personal characteristic into something more beneficial & substan-

tial to my professional brand:

Im a dreamer. -> We believe in a better tomorrow.

Im passionate about helping other people. -> We want to help you be better at X.

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I dont make excuses for myself. -> We accept our limitations.

I want to learn something new every day. -> Were in permanent beta.

I believe in finding a work-life balance that works for me. -> Were not just about busi-

ness.

Im a unique individual. -> Well treat you as a unique individual.

I wear my heart on my sleeve. -> Were human.

I learn from mistakes and I like sharing those experiences. ->Well make mistakes, but

well be honest & transparent about them.

When I work, I work hard. -> Well do our best for you.

Im impulsive. -> Were dynamic and well always try new things for our continuous im-

provement.

In the second list, youll notice that re-packaging has only changed the way a characteris-

tic isphrased- it didnt change the inherent value of the characteristic at all! It simply im-

provedthe way you tell people about your business.

As a rule of thumb, your re-packaged output should NOT contradict who you really are.

For example, refer to the I learn from mistakes and I like sharing those experiences char-

acteristic.

Using this, I can NOT re-package the brand as Well be perfect for you! I inherently dont

believe that being perfect is even possible. Why would I promote something that I dont be-

lieve in? Id be setting myself up to failure!

Re-package but dont change.

Improve but dont completely modify.

Move forward but dont change the direction.

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Brand The Way You Think

By now, you have already learned that: - your personal characteristics should influence

your professional brand; and, - your personality traits should be re-packaged to produce

communicable brand statements.

Weve also established that:

You are your brand: your brand is your personal contribution and your professional

legacy to your chosen industry.

You are your passion: you needto work on something you feel strongly about.

You are your unique personality: you should incorporate your unique characteristics

into your business brand.

Since uniqueness is hugely important, were going to focus on it now.

Considering the competitive landscape in the general marketplace, its critical for your busi-

ness to craft an unforgettable and unique brand.

Why is having a unique brand important?

1. It ensures that youll have a unique business identity as well.

2. It sets you apart from your competition.

3. It gives you a competitive advantage that primarily drives your growth and success.

4. It promotes a better sense of brand awareness as customers are most likely to re-

member you if you stand out from the crowd.

5. It personalizes your brand and connects with your customers in a more intimatelevel.

Being unique encourages your target market topay attention to you.

However, having a unique brand isnt enough. You dont just stop there. To ensure that

youre building a brand that

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aligns with your characteristics and values; and,

results in an unforgettable, unique brand

you need to brand the way you think about everything.

Imagine this: your target market is nowacknowledging you and paying attention to you.

So, the next step to keep your customers interested and make them choose you is to

brand the way you think.

What do you think about X?

Let us begin by focusing on the idea generation (and selection) part of building a business.

You were able to pursue a certain business concept because you applied a unique thoughtprocess. You:

Assessed if you had the resources to pursue a specific business venture,

Investigated the competitive landscape,

Researched on your industrys trends,

Understood what your target markets key problem is,

Developed a unique solution to your target markets problem,

Evaluated if your proposed solution had helped your potential customers; and,

Modified, as necessary, your initial solution to better solve your target markets key

problem.

This unique thought process is what you should be utilizing during your brand-building

stage.

You have already encountered the heart (passion and personality). So, its time for you to

deal with the mind now.

Google, for example, was able to practice a unique thought process.

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When Sergey Brin & Larry Page started out to create Internet search back then, they

wanted to solve the problem offinding relevant resources online.

However, at that time, the only option available was to use directory-based sites that, on

average, only extended to a small part of the published web.

Sergey & Larry, however, believed that Google should be different. By utilizing a unique

thought process, they thought that Google should index everythingand use algorithms to

rank the results according to the userss preferences.

This unique thought process made Google hugely successful today!

Google was unique. They wanted to answer their target markets problem even if it meant

using a thought process thats different from the rest.

Looking at Google as a brand today, this unique thinking still applies:

Google is a big data-type company that thrives on developing products and services

that make use of as much data as possible.

Google understands that you are unique, so, all of their products and services are

personalized according to your preferences.

Google effi

ciently works in a clean-cut manner. This minimalist approach is successfulin making everything focus on its users.

These are all parts of Googles internal DNA (how the company works) and Googles exter-

nal framework (how the customers perceive the company).

Its not about the product or the products specific feature - its about

the overall business brand.

While Googles different products and the features thereof helped improve its reputation,

Googles overall branding system is still its main driver of success.

As an example, let us consider Google Search, one of Googles services. To the Average

Joe, Google Search is stilljustsearch. To this user, Google Search and Bing Search (for ex-

ample) are exactly the same.

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But, he stillchooses Google Search over Bing! The fact is, Average Joe doesnt even care

about clever algorithms or technicalities. He just cares about Googles great reputation

when it comes to prioritizing their users preferences!

Why do users trust Google so much?Simple. Its because its exactly what Google communi-

cates with its branding.

Googles reputation is built on the premise of Do no evil and give people the best search

results possible. Users trust Google just because they believe in the way Google thinks

about things!

So, let me ask you again: What do you think about X?

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Be The Face Of Your Brand

Throughout this chapter, weve repeatedly emphasized the fact that your brands founda-

tion is built on your characteristics and work ethics:

Personal You = Your Professional Brand

You should be your companys poster boy/girl because you and your brand are one

and the same.

Be the face of your brand. Doing so not only personifies your brand - it also brings out

your brands authenticity.

Being the face of your brand communicates your brands sincerity and genuineness to

your potential customers. It tells them that your business is managed by a real-life person!

Human VS Robot

As a human, which would you prefer to talk to: to another human being or to a robot?

Which conversation would be more interactive and natural?

Since youre an emotionally healthy individual, you answered human-to-human communi-

cation, right? The relationship between both humans is more interactive and natural as

compared to the relationship between a human and a robot, of course.

If you said robot, then you have serious socializing issues. Work on thatfirst. :)

A robot is stated since a business and a brand are inanimate and automated - robot-like

to an extent. Unlike their human customers, businesses and brands arent human. So, the

way these robot-like businesses communicate with their humane audience is limited.

For you to succeed, go beyond this limit.

Youre selling to humans. The way you communicate should be humanly - yes?

Going back to being the face of your brand: when you started reading this book, your

brand was a blank canvas. In the subsequent chapters, we started painting the picture of

what your brand is.

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Everything weve discussed until now has focused on your passion, personal characteris-

tics and thought processes. These are not only the human elements of your brand but

theyre a start.

The real human part of your brand is the way you interactwith your businesss target cus-

tomers.

Caput, Cor, Manus (Mind, Heart, Hands)

This is a Latin expression meaning: To achieve excellence, always incorporate these three

factors.

Youve dealt with the heart and the mind: now, youre dealing with the hands.

Sell and communicate your brands message using your hands.

The Stage is Yours

As your businesss founding entrepreneur, youre in the best position to interact and sell

your brand. Youre your businesss best brand ambassador!

Theres no other marketer in this world who can do this as passionately and authentically

as you can. You conceived this idea by the way that you think, so you can sell this idea by

the way that you act!

Let your personality (heart) & thought processes (mind) shine during interacting (hands)

with your target customers.

I do NOT mean this in the way you talk to the press. No, Im talking about the way you inter-

act with your customers.

Ifyou were your market (external customer), how would you like your concern to be ad-

dressed?

Ifyou were the employees (internal customer), how would you tell your customers about

your business?

The test of whether you are successful in this is to ask your customers who the founder/s

of your business is/are. If theyre able to tell you anything about the founding team, youve

made the stage yours.

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Branding Is What You Do

Weve already discussed few of the things that you can do to interact with your customers

and be the face of your brand.

Note the word do. :)

Do is a verb that is usually accompanied by the noun hands. (Manus, Caput, Cor, re-

member?)

Do encourages you to take action.

Do inspires you to make a change.

We can spend forever talking about your passion and discussing about how your brandshould inherit its characteristics from you.

Heck, you can even proclaim yourself to be the face of your brand and stick with plain talk-

ing. But, this isnt enough!

As a person, who are you most likely to trust, the one who: - talks the talk, or -walks the

walk?

The answers obvious!

Lets look at another comparison:

If you were a rich dog looking for a dog friend to be your bodyguard, who are you most

likely to pick to protect you, the dog who: - barks the loudest, or - bites the hardest?

Actions speak louder than words.

What you say isnt thatimportant.

Its what your customers see that really matters.

You can influence your audiences perception of you through your consistent and relevant

actions.

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Remember, your audience will easily call bullshit on your brand and business if you dont

back up your words with actions. Your business deliverable should reflect your brand state-

ments. (Deliverable pertains to your products, services or customer relations.)

If what you say and what you do arent the same, your customers would feel that youre

just fooling with them.

Of course, customers dont want to be fooled! To be a successful brand, you need to be

consistent with what youre communicating and how youre communicating it.

How to Mess Your Brand Up

Lets say that one of your primary brand characteristics is efficiency - this is doing some-

thing effectively while using the least amount of time.

Some actions that can waste all your branding efforts are:

Arriving late for a meeting: Regardless of who youre meeting (employees, potential

customers, stakeholders), if you advocate for efficiency and you arrive late, this move

contradicts your core characteristic! What does this say about you when you cant be

on time? How will the person youre meeting perceive you?

Developing a SaaS product that has so many irrelevant features so this product sub-

sequently creates such a horrible and bloated UI: How exactly are your users sup-

posed to efficiently use this product if its features are scattered all over the place?

How will your users perceive you?

Passing the buck: You receive an e-mail from a customer requiring urgent help. In-

stead of directly helping, you redirect the customer to team member who only helps

the customer much, much later. Here, the customer wastes a whole bunch of his

time asking your team member to help him look for the solution to his problem. Howwill your customer perceive you?

Giving disorganized service: You offer your customers a promising service. Its effi-

cient because it ensured an increase in your bottom-line profit. However, the opera-

tion of the service is disorganized and chaotic.

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As a business promising to efficiently solve its customers problems, whose efficiency mat-

ters most: yours or your customers?

Obviously, Im citing extremist-type examples to make a point: your brand cant say one

thing and then turn around and do another thing which is completely contradictory to

what your brand just said.

Thats not successful branding.

Successful branding is about saying one thing and then doing the thing that you just said.

As a brand, everyones eyes will be on you. Your customers perception on your brand is

critical to your brands success.

Your brands authenticity is nurtured by the consistency and correlation between your

words and your actions.

Conversely, if your brand is abundant in only words and deficient in actions, you might as

well close up your business right now.

For your brand to get a lot of love and kudos from your audience, back up your words with

concrete and proactive action.

Actions to Capitalize on Your Brands Strengths

Lets turn the above example around. Professionally speaking, here are a couple of things

that I would do. I will:

Never be late for a meeting and ensure that the meetings agenda is concise, clear

and well-defined.

Develop a SaaS product that will include only the most-needed features and produce

the most helpful UI to aid my users in being more efficient.

Do anything within my power to help every customer receive the quickest resolution

to his concern. Ill even go the extra mile just to give every customer of mine the top-

notch service that he deserves.

Prioritize my customers efficiency over my own, regardless of operating margins.

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These are all obviously much easier said than done - what you need to remember is that

your branding doesnt need to be extremely perfect. Youre allowed to make mistakes

along the way.

But, always keep on going. Own up to your mistakes and portray them as stepping stones

for your learning.

Dont take your mistakes for granted - learn from them so that you can improve both your

personal characteristics and your professional brand.

Documents

Brandiing your Business