Brand; What People Say About You When You Leave The Room
What do people say?
What do people say about you when you leave the room? Think about it for a minute. Was it hard to imagine? How can you ensure that what is said about your brand is in line with what you want people to think of you? As emotional creatures, we pay particular attention to our connections and communications with other people. We might heed to a dress code to a particular event, or change the tone and language if we are speaking with a small child. It would be amazing to think that someone said how much he or she loved your style or said what a great person you are. Now, imagine what people would say about your business.
According to Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, “your brand is what other people say about you when you’re not in the room” and people’s responses to brands can be as emotive as they are to other human beings. How many times have you said that you ‘loved’ a product or brand? (I personally love my new Mahabis slippers in part for their beautiful design). A good brand is remembered (in the right way), a mediocre brand is very rarely remembered.
Your business’ personality
Branding isn’t just about the logo, it embodies the personality of the business, it speaks volumes about who you are, where you are going, and why people should love you.
Lois Geller writes about why brands matter - the point here is that brand is extremely important to the success of the business and can’t be done quickly. Don’t ignore your brand as you’re starting out or building your business - ‘it’s shorthand for what you are’.
How do you develop your brand?
So, how do you develop your brand? At 25eight, we start by understanding your vision, what is the change you want to see in the world, why do you get out of bed in the morning to do what you do? Simon Sinek talks about understanding your ‘why’ so that people know what they're buying into. We also liken it to putting a destination into Google Maps, the software knows where you are going and can work out the best route to get you there. If you know where you're going it will help you get there, it will also help other people understand and buy into helping you get there.
Next, you want to understand why you are different, and how you are positioned in the market. What is the value you provide to your customers that they don't get from an alternative? This is crucial, you have to put yourself into your customer’s shoes; what is it that they see as valuable and hopefully this aligns with what you are the best at. We want to outrank our competition on value.
Now you have to understand who will see those things as valuable, who are the early adopters that, when they hear about what you are trying to do will buy into it straight away. This isn’t just about a particular market segment or demographic, we want to get to the heart of who these people are. What drives them, what are their goals and ambitions, what are their fears and challenges, how are you helping to solve their problem or improve their situation and why do they care about it? Understanding the human (regardless of whether we’re B2C or B2B) is at the heart of being a human-centred business. There will be people that value what you do more than others and those are the people you want to talk to and engage with your brand.
Brand is a perception
You can only influence someone’s perception of your business and we can do that using communication through the senses. We want people to feel something when they interact with us (hopefully in a positive way).
Think of cheap versus premium, if the business has got it right when you encounter the premium brand you’ll get a sense of it being premium with everything you interact with, prior to purchasing through to the purchase and the after-sales. Our expectations are definitely a lot lower when we interact with a cheap brand (think of a budget airline), however, cheap may be what the brand is built upon.
For your business, think about what are you promising your customers, and what might be their expectations of you. Now think about all of the touchpoints (the points of interaction) they will come into contact with. How can you communicate (visually, verbally or through experience) so that they leave feeling what you want them to feel?
For example, we’ve worked with a restaurant whose name translates to ‘Grandma’s house’. The owner wanted everyone who experienced the restaurant to feel like they had visited their Grandma’s house. Within the Brand guidelines (a document developed to ensure everyone in the business created the right experience) it detailed the right tone of voice, type of language and even the emoji’s to use in any written communication. Before you even encounter the restaurant itself, you feel the warmth and love as if you’re interacting with your Grandma 👵.
Brands build advocacy
If you get it right, it can be game-changing for your business. There are many benefits to creating a really great brand, but the best by far is the advocacy and loyalty you will get from the customers that love what you do. They’ll help spread the word of your awesomeness and do your marketing for you!
Are you a Startup or small business wanting to get investment or more customers?
We can help!
Brand is just one of the elements we teach in our Pitch Training Program aimed at helping you to develop a winning pitch and/or brand story so that your audience wants to take action.
Have you ever wished that when you explain what it is you do to an audience, they got it straight away - whether you’re presenting to them physically in an investor or client meeting or digitally in your marketing copy?
That’s exactly what we help you to do, such that when you communicate about your business, you get higher conversions.
Not only do you develop the strategic smarts to adapt your pitch in every situation, you get supported by an industry expert mentor to tailor your approach to reach your goals.
Is this the year that you take your business to the next level?
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