What is Brand?

Launching a brand

You often hear entrepreneurs talking about launching a brand. The reality is it is not something that you create and communicate to your audiences – you build it. Your brand is what your audiences say about your business when you leave the room and it’s a combination of everything you do and everything you say.

Brands take time and effort to build and are based on values, rather than features, functions, publicity or a logo. They are also very easily destroyed. When you’re thinking about building your brand – about the things you want your audiences to say about you when you’re not in the room – think about what values they will buy in to and how you and your team members can demonstrate that to them on a daily basis.

A brand is like a stick of rock

Brand is often very closely tied to an entrepreneur’s vision, but needs to be like a stick of seaside rock – the values must be consistent wherever somebody engages with it, from sales to product development, customer service to social media. If the experience of brand is not consistent it’ll do more damage than good to the growth of your business.