Make Your Brand Story Resonate With Your Customers

Everyone has a story.  Every company, every product, every community, every industry has a story.  Think about your own story for a moment.  If you were to write your biography, how would it go?  What would it say about you?  Everyone, no matter how young or old, has gone through experiences both good and bad.  These experiences may have been experiences that others have also lived through.  But everyone views these experiences differently.  What might have seemed to be traumatic and life-altering to one person can seem like just a bump in the road of life to someone else.  Now, in writing your personal story, remember that not everyone really cares to hear it.  But some people, the key people in your life, will want to know every juicy detail.

What's your story?

Now relate that to your business.  Your business also has a story to tell.  Whether your business has only been in operation for 3 months or for 25 years it still has a history.  And, just like your personal story, not everyone cares to hear about your business.  Only a few key people really want to know who you are.  Your story is the basis of your brand.  You can’t develop a brand until you know the whole story.  So, think about what you want people to know about you.  Being authentic is the key to developing trust with people.  Be upfront about your shortcomings.  Let people in.  We’ve all made mistakes.  We’ve all done things we wish we could go back and change.  But life moves on and going back to change something that’s already happened isn’t possible.  The bigger your company gets, the more you are under the microscope.  I hate to say it, but there are people out there who want to see you fail.  Most people genuinely want to see you succeed, but some don’t.  But those aren’t the people you need to be concerned with.  When you remain authentic and conduct your business with professionalism and respect, and handle mistakes swiftly and with dignity, you will make a name for yourself that people remember in a positive way.  Those naysayers who want to bring you down won’t be able to. 

Who are the people you most want to attract?  You may very well have more than one target market, but don’t try to be everything to everybody.  Like I said, some people are not people you need to be targeting to.  So, think about how your target market wants to communicate with you.  What do they want and why do they want it.  People want to feel a sense of belonging, a connection, a feeling of being understood.  Last year, Shania Twain published her autobiography.  I went through an experience very similar to one she had gone through and as I was reading her feelings about it, I felt like, “she gets it”, she’s someone I could totally sit down with and talk about this and we could totally relate to each other.  She is one person who automatically comes to mind when I say “personal brand”.  Like Madonna or Cher, Shania only needs one word for people to know who she is and what she’s about.

Company brands are no different from personal brands in that they create an image in the minds of their customers.  That brand is developed through trust, by being true to who they are and marketing to like-minded consumers.  People develop a loyalty to a brand because of the feeling of understanding and connection.

So, whether you are developing a brand for your company or a personal brand for yourself, keep these tips in mind.

·         Stay true to who you are

·         Don’t apologize for who you are

·         Own up to past mistakes but don’t dwell on them.

·         Market your message to the right market

You’ll know when your brand story has resonated with the right market.  Your ideal customers will become repeat customers and become the biggest ambassadors for your brand.  So, what is your story? 

Mind Your Ps and Qs When Sending Out Business Communications

Building a brand requires a lot of work and consistency in every single way you communicate to the public.  I’ve said this over and over in previous blog posts, but I want to reinforce this one more time.  The brand that you develop for your company is the unique vision that the public has of you.

The way you communicate with your customers is absolutely vital in developing that positive impression.  Think about all the levels of communication you distribute throughout the day.  You post on your business Facebook wall, you send out emails to current clients and to prospects, you send out email newsletters.  Have you ever given much thought as to how your communication sounds and looks?  In this blog I want to give you some tips on how to improve your electronic communication.

Let’s start with emails. 

How many emails do you send in a day?  Probably more than you'd like to, right?  Here are some of things you need to consider before sending your next email:

1.       Grammar and Spelling – One of my biggest pet peeves is poor grammar and spelling.  Spell check is there as a guide to help you correct mistakes on the fly.  However, you can’t fully rely on it.  If you don’t know the difference between there, their, and they’re or to, too, and two, please find a dictionary to get it right!  Spelling is also vitally important when it comes to spelling someone’s name.  Please double and triple check the spelling before sending out the email.  It's just respectful.

2.       Tone – Sometimes in written forms of communication, the tone you intend to project doesn’t quite get across the way you wanted it to.  When composing emails, especially emails that you might be all fired up about, write it but don’t send it right away.  Go back to it a short while later (after you've cooled off!) to re-read it and adjust it accordingly.  The last thing you want to do is to inadvertently make somebody angry.

3.       Spam – I get emails sent to my main business email address all the time from companies all over the world claiming to be an expert who can help me with my business.  If I need an SEO expert or a graphic design artist, I’m not going to contact some guy in Cambodia!!  So, make sure the emails you send are going to people who actually want them, to people who have specifically opted in to receive your content.

4.       Timing – Don’t bombard people with tons of emails on a daily basis.  Just because they have opted-in to receive emails from you doesn’t mean you can fill their inboxes with info.  Sometimes you might have an urgent situation that needs to be dealt with.  Picking up the phone and calling that person is going to be a lot more effective than sending them an email every 20 minutes until they respond!!  That goes back to the spam point made earlier.  Too much of a good thing is not good.

Social Media:

Social media is extremely important to your company image.  But of course it’s different from emails and newsletters.  Posting on Facebook is a great way to interact with customers.  But just remember that whatever you put on Facebook is there forever.  It’s great to get into a discussion, even a debate, but before you post anything, please take a moment to think before you type.  Then after you’ve typed it and before you hit “Comment”, please read it a few times to make sure it makes sense, your tone is appropriate and things are spelled correctly.

Be sure to create a business Facebook page and post content on there that is valuable to your audience.  Also, remember that you are an extension of your business, so even though you may be posting business appropriate stuff on your business page your personal page needs to reflect a positive image too.  Like I said earlier, once it's out there, it's out there forever.

Now, Twitter is a whole other ballgame.  Like text messaging, you only have 140 characters to get your point across.  Twitter is also a great way to interact with customers.  However, when you're adding @ and # to your messages, the message can sometimes sound a little odd.  Please proofread it before you hit ‘Tweet’ to make sure it makes sense.  And although you can (and should) post to Twitter more often than other social media sites, don't post stuff just for the sake of posting it.  Make sure it's something actually valuable to your audience.  If it isn't, after awhile they won't read your posts any more or they'll just 'unfollow' you altogether.

Linkedin is a social media site that allows you to connect with other professionals, showcase your expertise, and search for job opportunities.  This is not where you need to tell the world about your weekend plans or what you made for dinner.  Your objectives here are very different than on other social media sites, so take that into consideration when you're posting on there.  Consider the audience and what they want to see.

All I’m saying here is that you need to keep in mind what kind of image you are trying to project.  So, the key takeaways I want you to get from this post are: 

• Be consistent, but not spammy. 
• Consider your audience and your objectives.
• Proofread.  Then proofread again.  And again.
• Keep your professional image in mind with everything you write and post.

The last thing you want is for your potential customers to get the impression that either you don’t know how to spell or that you’re too lazy to take the time to correct it.  Not quite the impression you want to leave in a prospects mind!