Now
that your company is established and has some sales activity, you'll need to
think about your brand. However, you should resist the temptation to
making branding a DIY activity. Here's why:
1. You
probably don't understand the concept.
Unless
you've actually branded a company or product in the past, you probably think
that brand consists of your name, logo, tag line and the look and feel of your
products.
In
fact, your brand is the emotion that customers and potential customers feels
when they experience your product and service. Those brand elements can only
reflect that emotion.
If you
miss that basic concept, you'll waste time, money and mental energy on those
brand elements rather than on the emotions you're attempting to elicit.
By
contrast, a talented outside branding firm will zero in immediately on the
emotions and arrange the elements to fit those emotions.
2. You
can't see yourself from the outside.
Presumably
you've worked hard to create a product that you believe to be exciting and
interesting and, along the way, gained some self-awareness of your strengths
and weaknesses.
However,
the "vision" that made all that possible is a huge impediment to
understanding what others might value in you and your products and that
effective branding next to impossible.
As the
great Scottish poet Robert Burns famously wrote: "O, wad some Power the
giftie gie us, to see oursels as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder
free us."
An
outside branding firm, by definition, has an outsider's viewpoint and is thus
less likely to get caught up in your inside-looking-out vision.
3.
Talented brand managers simply aren't available.
Branding,
like selling, can't really be taught in colleges or universities. It's an
art, not a science, and it's the kind of art where every situation is unique.
Of
course, MBA programs often often feature branding case studies, but what worked
for Coke, Sony, Apple and Tesla isn't going to work for your startup.
Even
previous experience branding for another firm in the same industry isn't always
that useful. In branding what worked yesterday isn't likely to work today, much
less tomorrow.
Individuals
who have broad experience in branding at different levels are much more likely
to be working for companies than specialize in branding than looking to work in
your firm.
4. You
can focus on sales rather than marketing.
Like
everyone else, you have a limited amount of energy to put into your business.
Necessarily, much of that energy must focus on creating a great product or
service.
When
you're not actively working on that core, your time is probably best spent
working with customers and potential customers, rather than branding.
With
startups and early-stage companies, customers want to work directly with
C-level executives. Therefore, your non-development time is best spent
developing opportunities.
While
this is happening, an outside branding firm can help understand why your
current customer are buying and identify the emotions that your branding
campaign will seek to intensify.
5.
You'll strengthen your exit strategy.
Unless
you're planning to grow your company indefinitely, you've probably got an exit
strategy: either an IPO or being acquired by another firm.
Because
brand is crucial to how your company is perceived, nothing says "likely to
fail" than an amateurish or awkward brand.
Companies
with a highly professional brand concept and brand elements that match are far
more likely to seem attractive to investors, investment banks and acquiring
companies.
A truly
talented outside branding firm can create the impression that your company and
products are greater than the sum of the parts, thereby ensuring the best
possible price.
Credit: Geoffrey
James
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