5 Key Components to Branding Your Side Business - #55

Show Notes

In this episode Lori Vajda and Nola Boea share 5 creative branding tips so you can develop irresistible messaging to promote your side business with confidence!
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As a new entrepreneur you don’t want prospective buyers comparing you to your competition. That’s why branding is so important for small businesses to get right, sticky right! Come take a listen and find out how to develop branding for each of the  touchpoints and interactions between your business and your prospects and buyers.

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In This Episode You’ll Learn 

• The difference between brand and branding and why you need to know them!
• Why branding is just as, if not more, important for small side businesses as it is for large companies.
• How to communicate your key competitive advantages.
• Tips for quickly discovering your business differenientators.

Key points Nola and Lori are sharing in this episode:

• (6:30:37) Defining the difference between brand and branding and how that can lead to powerful messaging.  
• (8:36:45) Three companies who are breaking with traditional branding and messaging to create something innovative.
• (12:14.21) What you can learn from those innovative companies changing the way we think about branding.
• (13:28.69) Using branding to go beyond delivering messaging around your products, But using it to include how you deliver memorable customer experiences.
• (16:20.32) The framework you can use for branding your business so you can move from being a company similar (‘me too’) to your competition, to one (‘only me’) that truly differentiates your small business.

Resources 
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This episode was supported by: Be-YOU-nique
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ConvertKit: Our #1 Favorite Email Marketing Platform 
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Transcript

[00:00:00] Lori: Whether you're a new entrepreneur or an established one, you are in a position where connecting with and motivating prospective customers is essential. Which means you're not only the marketer, but likely the marketing team for your business. Effective branding and marketing is all about creating the action you want your prospects and clients to take. stick around listeners because we're giving you a creative approach, so you can promote your side business with confidence. 

[00:00:28] Announcer: You're listening to the Sticky Brand Lab podcast, where time strapped professionals like you learn how to create a business you love in as little as three hours a week.

[00:00:41] Nola: Today, we're focusing on branding. More to the point, small business branding done right. And by right, we mean the kind of branding that both promotes your products and differentiate your business, so it truly sticks in the minds of your target audience. But before we do, welcome to Sticky Brand Lab, the podcast where we share essential entrepreneurial tools, shortcuts, and advice from leading entrepreneurs, industry experts and our own real-world experience. So professional women, like you can mindfully launch your side business quickly and without breaking the bank or feeling overwhelmed. Because the only thing more empowering than knowledge is being able to take confident, decisive action. 

[00:01:20] Lori: In today's episode Nola and I will be discussing how small business entrepreneurs use branding to create an unforgettable and irresistible product and a unique buyer experience for their customers. By the way, we will be using “product” to refer to the actual product and, or a service. And we're going to use the term “customers” to include prospective customers as well as clients. So, Nola, how would you define brand? 

[00:01:50] Nola: Okay. If I had to say something off the top of my head, I would say it's something about the look, feel, experience and personality of a company or a thing, or a entity. 

[00:01:59] Lori: I think that kind of sums it up. The reason I asked that question is often people talk or use the term brand, branding and marketing all the same. Like they're interchangeable. To some extent that's kind of how it's been portrayed. The truth is if you ask 10 industry experts or successful entrepreneurs, what a brand is, you’d likely to get 10 different answers. So we just wanted to simplify things right from the beginning for you listeners, and we're going to be using Wikipedia to help us do that. Wikipedia defines brand as “the name, a term, a design assemble, or any other feature that identifies one seller's product distinctly from those of other sellers.” And that's important because that's kind of the esthetic about your business, but that's not branding. 

[00:02:58] Nola: No, those are things it's not an "ing." Hey. 

[00:03:02] Lori: Hey!

[00:03:16] Nola: So let me ask you a question. How would you say branding is different than marketing? 

[00:03:20] Lori: I think branding is who you are and marketing is how you build awareness to that. So you might think of branding as strategic and marketing as tactical. 

[00:03:37] Nola: That's good. 

[00:03:38] Lori: Thank you. 

[00:03:40] Nola: So from a terminology standpoint, what really matters is knowing how, when, and the ways you can use branding and marketing to cut through the clutter, to leverage your business, products and services. You know, so they get into the hands of your customers.

[00:03:58] Lori: Agreed. Would you say that the company Nike is a product manufacturing company or a marketing company? And to give you a hint on that, we know that they're a manufacturer of shoes, but what comes to mind when you think of Nike? 

[00:04:21] Nola: Oh, well, they're awesome at the swish, the little squiggly on the shoes and the “just do it.” That was like my mantra when that came out. “Just do it.” 

[00:04:32] Lori: What you just described, those elements are brand.

[00:04:36] Nola: Yes. Those are the brand elements. 

[00:04:39] Lori: Originally, Nike primarily, when they developed their shoes, they developed their shoes for running. And most, if not, all of the employees were runners themselves. So they were really looking at filling a need that they saw, not only for themselves, but they knew that there was a like audience for that as well. So when other competitors also got into the arena, so to speak, Nike then started looking for ways to expand their product line, which was a running shoe. So they really started looking at developing shoes that fit different categories or different audience customer needs. Not only do they have different products, but they've really built campaigns and done some edgy commercials or ran some really compelling ads. And so it begs to differ. Are they a manufacturing company or are they just really good at being a marketing company?

[00:05:48] Nola: Both. I would say. 

[00:05:50] Lori: Well, now you can. So here's another example. You're familiar with Peloton, right? 

[00:05:58] Nola: I am now. Yep. 

[00:05:59] Lori: Peloton is the stationary bike company, for people who might not know that. So would you consider them a product manufacturing company or a digital fitness technology? 

[00:06:14] Nola: Ooh. Well, now I have to go with the latter. 

[00:06:16] Lori: Why? 

[00:06:17] Nola: Because 

[00:06:19] Lori: Trick question and you thought, well, 

[00:06:21] Nola: Yeah, so, and I don't have a trick answer for that. It just sounded better because it's not just a stationary bike. Right? 

[00:06:29] Lori: So this company really was developed because they themselves, the founders, and their startup employees as well, were bikers. They set out to create a stationary bike for home use. But especially during the pandemic, they really took off because you couldn't go out to the gym. So they were able to define themselves and to do iterations, I'm using the term iterations, but we could say that they also innovated the home fitness experience. But my point here is that brand is something that has a clear-cut identity among consumers, right? It's recognizable to customers. But how did they get that way? How do you end up recognizing and associating whatever you do with that brand identity? That's branding.

[00:07:31] Nola: The brand and all the elements is was one thing. Think of those as nouns. Branding, on the other hand, is a verb. Think of it as the actions you take, the things you do, to build the company's identity and position your business in the marketplace. A lot of it has to do with consistency in messaging or executing a campaign strategy or revising a different product you might have. 

[00:07:58] Lori: Going back to Nike, when you think of them. And you think of those ads or that swish and that motivation or what stands behind it. That's the awareness that branding can bring to the table. So there's the traditional, which Nike, even though they've had some really compelling ads and spokespersons, and they now move from running to a variety of athletic type or sports gear and shoes and clothing, they are still are in that fitness place, but they haven't revolutionized their position. So Nike represents more traditional. but a few names really come to mind for breaking out of the traditional line of thinking. And a good one to think about is Starbucks. So when you think of getting coffee, you might think of going to a restaurant or coffee shop, right. You're going to diner the diner. Exactly. And, Starbucks changed the way we think about enjoying coffee, not coffee products, but the environment in which you do that. 

[00:09:14] Nola: Where you can hang out, you can, you can loiter and sip and take up space and work and meet people. And nobody's going to kick you out until you buy another cup of coffee. 

[00:09:25] Lori: Exactly. That was a really important distinction. So Peloton, using that as another example, that company, they were changing the way in which you can do exercise. So you would either go to a gym and ride the stationary bike there, or you would be solo riding at home. And they opened up a different approach to riding a stationary bike by developing more of a trainer, to work out with, a community to work out with. They might not be there, but you can tap into it using their app. 

[00:10:01] Nola: See, that's cool. I did not realize that when I first heard about Peloton, I thought it was just a bike and a video. It's like, okay, well, you can probably pop that into a TV screen, but the way it, you had described it, where it evolved to where you can have an online digital community, you've kind of, that's totally new. That's something you could not have done in the traditional manner. And they really did create a new lane as far as I'm concerned.

[00:10:26] Lori: And now I've got another one to add to the list. It's the name of the company is Seedlip Spice 94. 

[00:10:35] Nola: Yeah, seed. Nice. Seedlip Spice 94. Seed, Seedlip Spice 94.
 
[00:10:41] Lori: Exactly. This is a non-alcohol spirit and the guy that developed this, his family has a background in farming and he doesn't drink alcohol. And inevitably when he would go out and be social, he was either limited to mocktails that tended to be more on the sweeter side, if you could find a bartender who could make a mocktail. So typically. he had to do like tonic water. So he came across a book on distilling and he experimented in his home using herbs and using vegetables, not to ferment them to the point of alcohol, but to provide the same type of experience that you would have from a distilled spirit. 

[00:11:30] Nola: Except for the drunk part.

[00:11:33] Lori: Exactly. And so for him, the lane was avoiding like the Shirley Temple or your sweeter mocktail. And the category that was not water or tonic water, ginger ale slash soft drink. So he came in to give people who wanted the experience of socializing, and the flavors without the alcohol. And when you think of some dietary needs, some religious needs and some preferences, he developed a category in and of itself. 

[00:12:08] Nola: He really did forge a new lane. 

[00:12:09] Lori: Exactly. 

[00:12:10] Nola: I mean, same big street, but a new lane on there. 

[00:12:14] Lori: There are lots of companies that are really out there kind of creating what I called the third category, but you're calling a third lane.
So can we talk about that for a second? 

[00:12:26] Nola: So whenever you say category, my business school textbooks kick in and you think of a category as like, you know, the paper category, of their home goods category and traditional teaching would have you say that traditionally, starting new category means a whole lot of education, a whole lot of marketing dollars behind trying to educate people that this new category exists. That's in the classic traditional definition of category. So we're not talking about introducing something in the market necessarily, that's going to be so different that people don't even know what you're talking about. We're talking about something that is familiar, but innovative enough that it's a new lane that's meeting totally new unmet, newly recognized needs and desires. So it's a paradigm shift. What I would say is an existing category. But you would say that it's different enough that it kind of is a new category. 

[00:13:28] Lori: One of the other key components to almost all of the brands that we've talked about thus far, is it wasn't just the product that they were offering. It was the experience for their target audience. And that's the key element of why we wanted to highlight branding in this episode.  

[00:13:52] Nola: To help you start thinking about this. We put together a few things to think about, to ask yourself, to prepare you, to approach the five key components that we will be talking about after this, in with a new perspective. What is the purpose of starting your company? What are the benefits of your product? What are the features of your product? What qualities do you want to be associated with your company? And, in what ways are your products different from your competitors? Once you answer these questions and as you think them through, you're going to begin to establish a framework that you will be able to use for branding your business. One that moves you from “me too” to “only me” in business. You don't want your prospects and clients comparing you to your competition. You want them to be able to say your business is the only one doing such and such. And then as you move from the ways you're similar to competitors, to the ways you're different, you will begin to paint a picture of what your business brand, voice, soul, and personality could be. Think about what will your other category, your new lane, look like? So how do you use branding to make your product stand out? 

[00:15:15] Lori: Part of why we thought this was really important because there's traditional branding and we didn't really want to talk about that. We were really looking at ways to be memorable, to cut through the noise. But really the truth here is, branding is somewhat vague concept to define. And for most entrepreneurs or solopreneurs the idea of branding has been something that large companies do or people with bigger budgets do because they often associate marketing with branding. And a good way to think about branding. It's really an opportunity at every touch point, every interaction between your business and your prospects or buyers. So defining branding for your business is like a journey of business self-discovery. But if you go through the steps that we're going to lay out here in the five key components to develop your branding for your business, it's going to make it a lot easier. 

[00:16:20] Nola: So we're going to get into these five key components now, so that you can just think about how to differentiate your key competitive advantages. You want to create a paradigm shift, basically. the first thing you want to do is to figure out who your target audience is. So like with Nike, it wasn't just runners. 

[00:16:43] Lori: I mean, it was in the beginning. 

[00:16:44] Nola: True, but it moved from running shoes to being a sport shoe for professionals and weekend enthusiasts and fitness seekers. And now for pretty much everybody. Just like our audience. We had gone through iterations and we had initially talked about the side-gigger, but we know now that our real target audience and the people that we resonate with and identify with and are more authentic with, are professional women who want to start a side business by expanding their expertise or following a dream. 

[00:17:22] Lori: And when you think of your target audience, it's better to drill down than to start broader. Great. So from there, the next thing you want to do is you want to think about what's the best way to get your audience's attention.

Now, this is interesting, and I'm going to use myself as an example here. I am a vegetarian. I'm not a vegan, but if you wanted to get my attention, I'm going to be looking for recipes or products associated for a vegetarian. I'm not thinking LinkedIn, for example. I'm thinking cooking magazines, cooking shows, places that are going to give me, uh, recipes that I can use because I love to cook and I love to eat. And so for me, where would I be? Where, for our audience and Sticky Brand Lab, where would they be? Where is your audience for your business? 

[00:18:26] Nola: Where do they go? And where can you meet them? 

[00:18:29] Lori: Exactly. 

[00:18:30] Nola: The third key component to branding is to put your ideal customer's interests first. Figure out what their interests are and be looking at that. Your example of being vegetarian is a good example. You really do not want to eat meat, but you want to have the experience of being able to eat like what everybody else eats. 

[00:18:53] Lori: Well, in general, somebody's motivation for being a vegetarian could be like me. They just don't want to eat an animal meat. So I don't have the animal rights as my main motivation. I don't like the taste of meat per se, animal meat. So a meat substitute for me, allows me to socialize and do the things that most people do, whether that's barbecuing or grilling. I just want to do it with plant-based not animal based. Right. So my. In being a vegetarian is going to look different than somebody else's interests, but that doesn't mean it doesn't serve the same need. 

And that's key component number four. What is the need of your customer? Trying to look at my interest in being a vegetarian is to not eat animal meat, my need is to find products that allow me to grill. There's the difference between my interest in being a vegetarian and my need for products that allow me to cook the way and bake the way that I want to. For Peloton, that was my schedule doesn't allow me to consistently go to a gym, or to go to a studio, and working at home doesn't give me the same workout that I did when I'm working with trainer or I'm in a class. So to get the same kind of workout that challenges me without being in a studio or the boring old way of working out at home. So a product that can allow me to do that fits that need. 

[00:20:38] Nola: So number five. You want to sell. Sell benefits instead of the actual product or the features of the product. So, we can go into that, but instead, I'd rather kick you over to episode 41 called The Savvy Entrepreneur: Winning Sales, by Selling Benefits. It goes all into the features verses the benefits. And it's the benefits that really make people want what you've got for themselves. 

[00:21:08] Lori: Well, it kind of circles back around. When you understand who your audience is, when you understand how to get their attention, what their interests are and what their needs are, benefits fits naturally because you're addressing all of those key components. 

[00:21:27] Nola: Very good. That's a good summary. 

[00:21:29] Lori: It's not that you don't bring in features. It's that you meet your audience where they are. You're looking for a way to differentiate yourself and why you created your business and explain that in a way that doesn't sound like everyone else.

[00:21:50] Nola: So. Does having a brand really mattered to a small business? Well, the short answer is yes, your brand matters regardless of the size of your business. And arguably it matters more for small side businesses because customers likely have more options. And if brand matters, then branding matters too. And doing it right from the start is why we're talking to you about this today. 

[00:22:17] Lori: By the way, this is just a starting point as you and your business evolve. And you become very clear on who your audience is and who you enjoy working with and how you best serve them, You’re going to find that your branding changes and evolves as you do. So listeners, thank you for joining us on this episode. We hope it makes all the difference in getting started on your side business so you can create your best and most exciting life.

Not sure how to create a brand? Want help with your branding? Contact us at stickybrandlab.com/contact. We'd be happy to help you. If you found the information shared here today, helpful, let us know by posting here where you're listening, or on our Facebook page. This way we can learn more about your business, your goals and ideas, as well as send you love, encouragement, and congratulate you on the amazing and courageous decision you've made.

Be sure to come back next Tuesday and every Tuesday for another informative, inspiring and motivating episode. And remember. Actions create results. So tap into your desire to create a business and brand you love, by taking 1% action every day. Small steps, big effects. 

[00:23:32] Nola: Do you have questions about creating a personal brand, side hustle or small business? Sign up for one of our clarity sessions. For more information, contact us at stickybrandlab.com/contact.

[OUT-TAKE]
[00:23:43] Nola: Did I say that, right? 
[00:23:51] Lori: Which word?