The word “brand” sounds simple and somewhat bland. However, your brand will ultimately determine your success in any industry or business. So ya, your brand is important!
I’ve been in this networking space for several years now, and one of the best conversations I have had around the subject of brand was with Cole Hatter a while back.
We talked about what your brand is and isn’t. He talked about his strengths and weaknesses when it came to building a brand that I think we can learn from. And most importantly, Cole really defined what happens when you don’t have a brand.
Let’s break the simple topic of “brand” down, shall we?
What Brand Is Not
So the first thing to talk about here is what your brand actually isn’t. If we can comprehend what brand isn’t, we can focus truly on what it truly is.
Your brand is not a logo. It is not a color scheme. Your brand isn’t a website, or a product, or even a specific service that you offer.
I think because our culture is so fascinated with “name brands” we often mistake what a brand actually is.
I think it’s important to note here that there is a difference between brand and branding. Your logo, color, website, etc. are all a part of your branding.
If I say McDonald’s, the image of golden arches may flash across your mind. That’s branding.
The jingle on the radio or at the beginning of a podcast show is branding.
Now, it’s not that branding isn’t important. It most definitely is. But branding should be the way your brand is viewed.
Should you spend time and resources in developing clean, professional, and even catchy branding? 100%
But you could have the most expensive branding out there, and if your brand hasn’t been built, it will fall.
So now that we know what your brand is not, let’s take a look at what it is!
What Brand Is
You ready for this???
Your brand is YOU! Yep, one word. So whether this is a personal brand for just you or a company brand for a collective ‘you’, the concept is the same. Your brand is who you are!
Your brand is how you made others feel. We’ll get into this more later, but for now, just hold on to that simple thought that you know your brand better than anyone else, because it’s you!
So, how do you find your brand?
There’s an article that I read a few years back that talks about simple steps to define your brand. I have linked to it here.
Think about your goals. Ask yourself what makes you unique. Utilize your personality in your story. Sum it up in one solid statement.
There’s obviously a lot more out there on building your brand, but if you can start with a solid brand statement, then everything else will flow out from there.
The Importance of Brand: My conversation with Cole Hatter
So now let’s really get into the meat of this post. The good stuff.
Here’s several excerpts from my interview with Cole that I think make the importance of brand crystal clear.
My first experience at Cole’s conference, Thrive:
Coming into this whole networking world for me was pretty eye opening in the beginning. I knew early on that building relationships was important, and I liked what I saw in John Lee Dumas and his podcast.
I saw a lot of value in what John had created and I wanted to learn more from him- be mentored by him. So I ended up investing with him and volunteering to help sell his journals. John invites me to Thrive, and I come in and see this whole culture of “Make Money Matter” with so many exciting things happening.
But one of the things that really intrigued me was how Cole had created this event.
Cole’s business was real estate. He had made his millions in real estate sales, real estate investing, and active investing.
But here he had taken that money and used it to make an event to help other people while still opening himself up to connections with all of these people he had not known before.
It was the beauty of networking right in front of me!
But I wanted to know how he was able to build his brand and increase his inner circle. So I asked him, and here’s what he had to say.
The Beginning of Thrive
Cole admitted that in the beginning he had zero brand. He had made his millions offline with no emphasis on social media or emphasis on personal brand.
He joked that he had an Instagram account in 2011 but didn’t post until 2015 because he did not see the importance of it other than to keep tabs on friends and family.
In the beginning, to get people to come to his event, he’d have to leverage the brand of his speakers. Tickets would sell if he could have big name people like Gary Vaynerchuk and Tai Lopez.
This was when Cole learned that in order for the event to truly be successful and grow and continue, he’d have to make it where the people came because they cared who he was and what the event “Making Money Matters” was. The special guest speaker was just the icing on the cake.
While he regrets not doing it sooner, he began to place emphasis on building his brand every year following that discovery.
Building His Brand
Cole knew what he wanted Thrive to be. He wanted to impact and help people.
Although he knew what his brand was, he also knew that he would need help to be consistent in getting the brand out there in front of people. So he hired someone to help him.
And while I understand that we can’t all just hire people to manage our brand for us, the important thing to note is here is that it is ok to get help with your brand! Yes, your brand is you, but that does not mean that you shouldn’t have the help or expertise from those who know more in building brands.
Sometimes the best thing you can do for your brand is hire a coach or mentor or pay someone to help you manage your brand!
When your brand grows, your opportunities grow.
Examples of Brand
It's not what you look like. It's not a logo. Your brand is how you make people feel, period. - Cole Hatter Click To Tweet
In my conversation with Cole, he gave an example to demonstrate this statement. Take Motel 6 and the Four Seasons. Both are places to sleep. They both have a bed, a shower, and a place to brush teeth. But the feeling you have about staying in a Motel 6 versus a Four Seasons hotel are vastly different. Why? Because they have built a brand around different goals.
In a loud marketplace of business and entrepreneurs, your brand is what sets you apart.
Build a brand that’s credible, honorable, and authentic. When people see the realness of who you are, they will follow.
It's important to build a brand and then the audience. - Cole Hatter Click To Tweet
You could have a restaurant in NYC in Times Square where the foot traffic is insane. You could even have the best advertising for the restaurant, but if the brand is poor quality food and service, people won’t come back. There might be an influx of attention, but eventually, it’s going to die out.
But take a mom and pop restaurant out in the middle of nowhere that may not have the best look or design, but they have epic food and quality interactions with their customers and their brand will build organically through word of mouth. Or by the fact that people are waiting in line out the door around the block to eat there!
Building a brand doesn’t happen overnight. It can take time, but that brings even more credibility to your brand- time and experience.
3 Guiding Principles for Building a Brand
At this point in the interview, Cole did what he does best, and he flipped it on me. He asked me what I thought were the important things to tell someone who was building their brand from the ground up with little to no following.
So I gave him three things that in my opinion have to exist when building your brand.
- Quality Content
- Consistent Content
- Content with Context
I know…too bad we can’t spell Quality with a ‘c’ or I’d have the perfect alliteration!
Develop quality content that has solid value. This largely stems from your brand statement and what you want your brand to accomplish.
Stay consistent with it. Here’s the thing about this too. Even if the quality of your content sucks in the beginning, staying consistent will help you improve over time. Want proof? Just go back and listen to the first few episodes of my show!
They are not that good, but I was consistent with releasing three episodes a week for a year, and over time, my content quality increased exponentially.
Have content with context. What do I mean by this? Your content has to line up with your brand. This is another reason to have a brand statement or mission to line it up with.
If you consistently release quality content that has nothing to do with your actual brand, it will either fail completely or turn into something entirely different.
Conclusion
Your brand is powerful. Whether it’s a personal brand or a business brand, your brand is important.
So if you are just starting out before you do anything else for your idea or business or industry, determine your brand, and put the steps into place to build it!
If you have already begun, and like Cole, don’t feel like you have a brand right now, it’s never too late to find it. Start now!
To hear my full conversation with Cole, click here.
And let me know in the comments below what aspect of building your brand stood out to you from my conversation with Cole.
Here’s to leaving every relationship better than you found! See you next week!
0 Comments