Tag Archives: small business

Positioning: The Brand Personality For Your Small Business

As discussed in Successfully Choose a Great Business Name, it’s important that your small business has a great brand name. A great brand name will put your small business on the front foot, giving you an edge over your competition.

But a great brand name is only one part of small business success. You also need to be able to support your small business brand name with substance. Without substance, your brand name is just an empty shell that won’t sustain a customer past their first inquiry.

It’s your positioning that provides the substance for your small business. Positioning is the personality and perception of your small business. Put simply, it’s the space that your small business and brand occupies in the mind of your customers.

Positioning: How Customers Perceive Your Small Business

How do I Influence the Positioning of my Small Business?

Notice how the heading is not ‘how do I determine the positioning of my small business’. This is because the perception of your small business is all the minds of your customers. You can’t tell them what they should think of you. You can only influence what they think of you.

Understanding the Perceptions of Your Businesses Category

All industries have perceptions. To successfully compete in an industry, you need to understand these customer perceptions. Examples of industry perceptions include:

I don’t understand cars. I’m pretty sure my mechanic rips me off
I believe what doctors tell me because they know more than me
My insurance is too expensive. Always
That service offer sounds too good to be true. There must be a catch
That financial company has been around for ages. I trust them more than that new finance company
It’s always more expensive to call out a tradesman on a Saturday and Sunday

Do not attempt to swim against this perception tide, it will just end in tears. Instead, acknowledge these perceptions and create a personality and perception which champions a solution.

Understanding the Positioning of Your Competition

How does your competition communicate with the market? How is your competition perceived by customers? Are they fun and lively or conservative and exact? If you note that most of your competition appears to lean towards being conservative, you may be able to differentiate yourself by taking more of a liberal approach.

The Virgin brand typically enters categories which are overly serious and boring. Virgin then uses its cheeky and irreverent personality to differentiate itself. Customers can then decide – choose Virgin or choose Beige.

Whatever positioning you choose for your small business – just don’t become beige. Don’t become part of the wall paper and DON’T copy the style of your competitors.

Alignment with Your Businesses Brand Name

Your positioning must also be harmonious with the brand name of your small business. Nurturing a fun family image will be difficult for the brand name ‘Stone Dark Scotty’s Playground of Doom™’

Visualise the Positioning of Your Small Business Brand

You may have an idea about your positioning, but to really articulate it, it’s best to visualise your brand as a person. This allows you to further develop the layers of your small business brand. It’s a bit like playing the Milton Bradley game Guess Who. Questions include:

If your small business brand was a person…

What would its gender be?
How old would it be?
Would it be married?
Would it have kids?
Is it an introvert or an extrovert?
What would it do on weekends?
What would it drink – water, coke, squash, beer, wine?
What clothes does it wear?
What kind of movies does it like?
How does it respond to a mistake?

When answering these questions, you will find that the image of your brand starts to become clearer. Once you’re finished, it’s best to reassess your brand’s personality based on the category perceptions and your competitors. Is there a harmonious fit?

Do you have a nearby business that seems to have an ‘x’ factor? Why do they appeal to you?

What is a Brand Name? It’s Everything

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In essence a brand is a label, which represents the promises your business pledges to deliver. This could be a promise of quality, competitive prices, convenience, fun, nostalgia or prestige. If you successfully choose a great business name, the operations of your business will have a better chance of success with your target market.

A brand is shorthand for a specific promise

In most cases your brand name is the shorthand for your small business.

A good brand will stand for key ideals that resonate with your target market. A bad brand will stand for indifference or nothing at all. Unsure if you believe me? Let’s step out behind the theory for a moment and examine your emotional responses to brands:

The Emotional Strength of Brands

Below is a list of famous brands. Take a moment to read each brand name

Toyota & Ford
BMW & Audi
Ralph Lauren & Yves Saint Laurent
Vespa & Aprilia
Amazon & Borders
Google & Yahoo
Facebook & Myspace
iPhone & Nexus
Pepsi & Coke
Pixar & Disney
NASCAR & Formula 1
Nike & Adidas
Intel & AMD
Nintendo Wii & Playstation
Yamaha & Kawasaki
Heinz & Campbell’s
Nikon & Olympus

Notice how your emotions rise and fall depending on the brand you are thinking about? Your response could be anything from a fleeting rejection to a strong bond full of imagery and praise. Your response is based on your experiences (either personal or second hand) and whether your experience lived up to the promises of the brand.

In a comparative situation, when you buy a brand’s product or service, you’re giving its ideals the thumbs up. You are identifying with something within that brand. All things remaining equal, you will generally stay loyal to this brand as long as its price tag matches the value of the brand promise.

What Makes a Successful Brand?

Firstly, a brand must own a promise that is easy to understand and valued by its customers. Famous brands that have managed to own a promise include:

Wikipedia – Free information online
Moët & Chandon – Prestigious champagne
Miele – Premium quality electrical products
Disney - Fun entertainment for the whole family
Tiffany & Co – The world’s premier jeweler
Harley Davidson – The original motorcycle
Photoshop - The standard for graphics professionals
Dove - The soap with ¼ moisteriser
IKEA – Great value furniture
Black Berry – Access and send information from anywhere
Heinz - Trusted food staples

Secondly, all brand activities must consistently apply this promise. This means, your promise needs to be embedded through every internal and external touch point and process.

This is where successful brands must be strong and maintain the focus. For months. For years. For decades! But most importantly – through staff changes. Brands should not waiver from their promise just because a few internal people are bored or looking to justify their value. Brands that stray from their promise undermine their long term value.

Brands take decades to build. It is the patient meticulous business owner that will reap the benefits.

What’s the name of your favourite brand? And why?

David

The Keys To Small Business Success

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Success in small business is far from easy. In fact, it’s extremely difficult. Especially if your small business is built on shaky foundations. If you trek off into the small business wilderness without knowing the basics, you’re bound to become lost and start drifting towards failure.

Rest assured, knowing the core fundamentals is reasonably straight forward. There are four key pillars of small business success. By understanding these four key pillars, you can structure every part of business and ensure it’s super charged for small business success.

Key 1: Having a Valued Unique Selling Point

Your small business needs to be known for being able to deliver something no other business can. This is known as your unique selling point/proposition (USP) This does not necessarily mean you need to have a unique product (although this would be ideal). It means that you need an offering that’s better than the competition can provide. This could either be:

Hard to source quality products
A combination package which combines valued products and or services
Superior choices of access (service hours, payment options, points of contact)
Superior environment (inviting touchpoints, empowered staff, sense of credibility)

It’s important that your unique selling point is valued and sought after by your target market, otherwise – who’s going to do business with you? And how will you be a small business success?

Like a USB: Your USP Plugs Into Your Whole Business

Key 2: Your Small Business Must Consistently Deliver

The key word here is consistency. When doing business you must strive to deliver the same experience each time. It’s this consistency which is so important in establishing your small business’ trusted reputation. In a nutshell, it’s consistency which helps you build your reputation and your brand.

Your small business also needs to thread the same messages across all internal and external touchpoints – day in and day out. Yes, all touchpoints! This includes your website, business cards, email signatures, store layout and invoice layouts. Without consistency your business can’t gain traction, which will hurt your dreams of small business success.

Like Clockwork: Consistent Application and Delivery is Critical

Key 3: Understand the Finances of Your Small Business

To achieve small business success you must be profitable, or at least be sustainable. You should have a thorough understanding about the financial position of your business, including:

Your break even point
Your margins
Your profit and loss statement
Your balance sheet

How’s Your Maths: You Need to Understand the Financials

Key 4: Have a Positive Attitude to Your Small Business

Starting a small business is exciting. Initially you won’t mind working the long hours, especially as you see your small business grow. But then the honey moon period ends and work starts to feel like work. This is when your attitude and mindset are so important. You need to stay positive. You need to keep looking for opportunities. You need to keep finding solutions to your relentless challenges. Without the right attitude you will be running your small business into the ground and taking everyone else with you.

‘It is your attitude, not your aptitude, that determines your altitude.’ Zig Ziglar

I can’t stress enough about how important these four small business pillars are. In fact, almost 100% of the content on this site will be directly related to achieving small business success by capitalising on these four key areas.