I live in San Francisco. For years, I've found it amusing to see a handful of all-over-the-map restaurants selling everything from pizza, donuts, espresso and chop suey...all offered on cluttered signs as part of the same menu!
Although I find it funny, even absurd, someone within these businesses must assume a strategy like this: "If I have everything anyone could possibly want under one roof, customers will have no choice but to give me their business.”
Not surprisingly, this is a flawed strategy. I never see many customers around these places. Why would anyone go out of their way to get their pizza and morning coffee from a business that specializes in neither?
These businesses lack a Brand Umbrella: a central, unifying theme that holds their business identity together. Unfortunately, many businesses present themselves to the world in the same unfocused way as these all-over-the-map restaurants.
Could you be confusing your marketplace with an unfocused message? If so, you may be losing business because people do not clearly see the benefits you provide or how you differ from your competitors.
Why Branding Matters
A Brand Umbrella holds your entire slightly famous marketing strategy together. When done effectively, brands enable you to:
• Differentiate yourself from your competition
• Position your focused message in the hearts and minds of your target customers
• Persist and be consistent in your marketing efforts
• Customize your services to reflect your personal brand
• Deliver your message clearly and quickly
• Project credibility
• Strike an emotional chord
• Create strong user loyalty
Small-business branding is about getting your target market to see you as the preferred choice. It’s not just about what you do; it's about what you do differently from everyone else.
Get Focused
Effective Brand Umbrellas are created around a distinct market niche.
A niche gives your marketing message a natural, sharp focus. The more you specialize, the easier it is to create and sustain a powerful Brand Umbrella, and the more your market will see the value of your services because you speak directly to their unique situation.
Avoid sending an unfocused message in your marketing by bundling disconnected themes, items, offerings, services together. To do this risks sending a message that you don't do any activity particularly well (a jack of all trades, master of none).
Identify your niche category or the overall industry or consumer segment you wish to serve, and create your Brand Umbrella with an eye on what members of your prospective niche have in common.
Staying focused is important but also hard. When the orriginal business plan isn't working fast enough different directions are taken, the result is an all-over-the-map business.
I repeat to myself all the time stay focused, stay focused.
Posted by: Dianna | June 28, 2006 at 03:34 PM