Marketing Tip: Brand YOU.

Branding You


When you think of Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, Rachel Ray what comes to mind? Each of these people have made a name for themselves within their respective profession. They each have branded themselves as an experienced professional. When they move on to promoting a product, people will buy because they respect and admire that person.

When you go about building your business, do you brand XYZ company? Do you promote ABC Team? Do you brand your mentor, or the CEO of your company? For so many years, building a business seemed to hinge on the credibility of a company or it’s highest paid producers. And, if for someone reason that Company or CEO took a fall, it caused a tremendous ripple effect, devastating everyone involved. That is one of the key reasons NOT to build your business---traditional or home-based---on the credibility of others.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t “piggy-back” on someone else’s credibility. Nor, should you neglect to mention a company’s success or good standing with the BBB. More so, the point is to build YOUR credibility with people that are looking at what you have to offer them. Your success does not lie in XYZ Company, ABC Team or John D. CEO. Your success lies within your OWN efforts and hard work.

To illustrate, let me give you an example that I was once presented with, when first learning this important concept---branding YOU. Let’s say you want to open a McDonald’s restaurant. You get everything set up and then you open the doors. Now, you will get some people that stop by out of curiosity and some by chance. But, that is not going to pay back all of the loans you initiated to open your business. You will need customers. And, you want happy customers. WHY? Well, people have the money, first of all. Second, people who are happy will come back. And, people who are happy tend to TELL OTHERS. Likewise, so do unhappy customers. So, you want to do your best to make sure the majority are happy, satisfied customers that come back, and refer the people they know.

The moral of the story here is that it is not enough to open the doors. It is not enough to have a brand name for your business. It is not enough that the franchise you bought has established itself as profitable. People that walk through YOUR doors need to be serviced satisfactorily by YOU. When they walk out of the doors, they can either be happy that you run the establishment OR they can choose another McDonald’s to eat at next time. Even if the Corporation starts to see a decrease in sales, you will not be affected directly, because you have established your business as one that cares about it’s customers and is aiming to please others. This will stand the test of time and can apply to any business, in any industry.