Your business has been running successfully for years, or decades.

In that time at least one of these has happened:

While a lot can radically shift in the environment and market that dramatically changes the way you do business, if you are like most businesses, your brand story has remained the same from day one. In many cases a business will do cosmetic tweaks from time to time and try varied marketing messages, but fundamentally nothing has changed at the core where it needs to.

It means your brand story isn’t aligned to your business and your market and that makes your selling harder. Not to mention the countless many who never even engage with you as they dismiss you at their first impression due to misconceptions about your brand. Many businesses are surviving (or barely) on word of mouth referrals, but that is not always a sustainable direction, or a path to growth.

Why is your brand story so important?

Your brand story is what underpins all your marketing and messaging. It is what your people unite under, and when they do, it is what creates raving fans. It is a rich and relevant brand story which transforms your business from competing as a commodity to becoming an emotional purchase. This is what brands should strive for, because when you do, you can command your price and reap the profits.

How do you realign your brand story?

We are currently developing a range of options including an online training program to take you through the full process of brand story realignment. But for now lets take one component, which I ran through with my team last week and it is amazing how much power lies within it. We refer to them as your Brand Keys.

Brand Keys:

1. Your Purpose – Some refer to this as your Mission, but purpose is more powerful. It’s your big WHY for existing.
2. Your Core Values – What are the handful of rules for your business? Defined, they empower your people to make decisions independently that are in line with your brand.
3. Your Key Differentiator – What unique and hard to replicate traits set you apart from your competitors?
4. Your Brand Promises – What are your three brand promises and how do you know you’re keeping them?

Once these are defined for your brand you can create a strong company culture around them and there are some cool ways of doing that, but that’s another post.

It is important to revisit these keys on a regular basis with your leadership team so that you brand stays freshly aligned, especially with the speed of change today. Remember, a Story Rich Brand is from the top down. When your leaders live it, they are leading by example.

Next Steps

I’d love to read your thoughts and questions so please share them below now and have a suitably awesome day!