How to Discover and Perfect Your Brand Story
Do you know why your customers do business with you?
Can you clearly articulate that as an elevator pitch? In other words, can you do it in 30 seconds or less?
When you attend networking events, mingle at parties, or wait for your airplane to board, you can unlock new opportunities if you can tell your brand story well. Otherwise, it’s business as usual and there’s not much fun in that.
Some businesses will never figure this out because they are not willing to try. Others simply give up too soon. Here’s how one small business owner figured it out along the way.
Sounds Like It’s Almost Homemade
Jim Koch is the Chairman of the Boston Brewing Company, brewer of Samuel Adams beer. He founded what is now a billion-dollar business by making it a habit to have one-to-one conversations with beer drinkers to understand them and share what makes Sam Adams unique.
Your current customers know, like and trust you. They understand and appreciate the passion and care that drives your business. That passion is a significant factor in buying decisions, and it comes through in your story.
Jim Koch learned this while having a conversation with a beer drinker that preferred one of the imported beers. The man reasoned that imports are backed by generations of talented brewers, whereas American beers are mass produced.
When Mr. Koch explained that he brewed his first batch of beer in his home kitchen, and to this day it is still “handcrafted in small batches that he personally approves,” he made a connection.
“Sounds like it’s almost handmade,” the man said.
Aren’t your landscape and lawn care projects handcrafted in small batches too?
A craft is something we do because we love it, and that love should come out in your brand story.
Just like that, the now booming craft beer industry was born, or at least it had a name that resonated with consumers. They were called micro-breweries back then and there were hundreds of them. Now there are thousands of craft brewers across the United States.
That conversation changed how Jim Koch marketed his beers, and one like it can change how you market your lawn and landscape products and services.
Nobody can tell your story like you can, but you have to find a way to discover what really matters. Talk to your customers. Then talk to everyone that is not your customer but should be, and learn how to connect the dots.
Within that gap is the story you must discover and perfect if you are going to grow your business beyond your current customer base.
Here’s why. Your current customers know, like and trust you. They get you because they know your story. The challenge is perfecting that story so that it resonates with complete strangers.
That brand story is content marketing. It educates and inspires new customers to do business with us. It’s a complex brew, so to speak, of what we do and why we do it that is infused with our passion and unique methods for getting beautiful results.
In his recently released book, Quench Your Own Thirst, Jim Koch notes: “Eventually, we would become known as a leader of the craft beer movement. All from listening to a guy in a bar.”
Now that’s a story.
Isn’t it time to learn how to get better at telling yours?
Digital Marketing Survey Report
We partnered with our friends at Landscape Management Magazine to create our First Annual Landscape Industry Digital Marketing Report.
Benchmark your business against industry peers and make new discoveries with the results of our First Annual Landscape Industry Digital Marketing Survey.
