This post is by Michael Pollock, the original owner of Small Business Branding. Yaro Starak now owns and produces the latest content for this blog.
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As the Venn diagram illustrates below, there are three
interdependent components to a successful small business brand. Those
components, when sufficiently developed, result in:
- meaningful relationships – personal and professional – among you and your network.
- revenue for you and your network.
- personal and professional growth for you and your network.
1. You – your energy, spirit, values, quirks, skill sets, etc. – all of who you are. The more you develop yourself, the stronger the
brand. The more of yourself you put into the mix, the stronger the
brand. In business, real value – it was once thought – was about just the product or service. Just the features and benefits. Just the slickest widget for the best price. Just the client’s results. Those days are gone.
Real value is still about all that PLUS who you are. What you re-present to others. The spirit and energy you express and
thereby give permission and validation for others to express.
"It is not possible that this unity of knowledge, feeling, and choice that you call your own should have sprung into being from nothingness … rather this knowledge, feeling, and choice are essentially eternal and unchangeable and numerically one … in all sensitive beings." (emphasis mine) – Erwin Schrodinger, Nobel Prize-winning Physicist
Not to get all mystical about it, but your heart and soul is the heart and soul of the brand, which is the same heart and soul of the folks in your network. Put it out
there. It has real value toward and beyond the bottom line. It’s liberating.
2. Your Network – their needs wants, desires, values, etc.
"Our value as individuals is vested in the web of connections we are able to build up over the course of our lives. We thrive in proportion to their power." – Sally Helgesen, Thriving in 24/7
Doc Searls (Cluetrain Manifesto) remarked recently: "By the way, the next step after Cluetrain, IMHO, is Markets are
Relationships." One could make the argument that business has always been about relationships to some degree. After all, without a customer, a product/service is useless. But today, in 2005, for us solopreneurs with limited/non-existent advertising budgets, we live and die by our connections.
You work to feed yourself and your family – mentally, physically and emotionally. You need to "feed" and nurture your network, who in turn feed and nurture you. Remember 8th grade science and that fancy word, symbiosis. A relationship of mutual benefit. Interdependence. That’s what it is. Get this. Embrace it. It’s simple, yes? No network. No brand. No business.
3. Shared Value – Commerce has always been about value exchange. I.e. money in exchange for a product or a certain result, etc. And like everything else – in 2005 – that’s no longer enough, right? Now it’s also about caring. Empathy. Sharing your passion.
"… PASSION (aka EMOTION, aka CARING, aka DRAMATIC DIFFERENCE) … has finally become recognized as the Staple of Successful Business. Not a poor second cousin to the "quant stuff" that business school still thrive on. Not an ‘option.’" (emphasis his) – Tom Peters, Re-imagine!: Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age
Yes, products and services are still a great way to exchange value. And when you infuse everything you do with genuine concern … genuine empathy … genuine passion … the whole system – you, your network, your brand – everything gets "ratcheted-up" a notch or two.