Your Brand is Your Shadow.

So your ready to promote your business and all you have to do is hire an agency, place some media and “put together” some ads, right? Hardly. You’ve missed the B word. It is the difference between a fleeting rise in sales and consistent growth in sales. It’s the difference between building your house on soft ground or a post-tension slab. It’s the difference between a company that stays in business for one year and one that is around for decades.And lastly, it’s the difference between your audience seeing your company and your audience experiencing a connection with your company.

Sounds like a bunch of psycho-babble branding, artsy talk, right? Well kind of. You see, branding is the basic foundation of how your company is perceived, not how you perceive your company. You might build the finest shutters in the world, but if your logo is in Times New Roman, your brochure is printed on a black and white Xerox® machine, and your office or storefront is a mess, your craftsmanship is perceived as sub-par at best.

Additionally, your brand promise is as important as your mission and value statement. The brand promise defines the personality of the company. It defines how people talk about the company, how your employees dress, what mediums you use to advertise, the way you sign your emails, and even the type of candy you have in your lobby.

For example: The MESH brand is centered around an approachable sans-agency experience. We want people to see and hear our talent and process, but want them to also know that they will not get lost in layers and layers of junior, senior, partner, blah, blah, blah staff members. We integrate everything–merging our creative services with our account services, our brand services with our marketing and PR services, and service the account like it’s our baby! We came to this conclusion after taking inventory of our culture, goals, competitive set, SWAT analysis, and the process we use to develop brands every day. We chose keywords, colors, fonts, copy, office décor, copy paper, paper clips, etc. that embody this.

Your brand follows you everywhere. It’s there when you walk into the elevator with a stranger, on Facebook, in your conference room chairs, the people you hire, the colors in your logo, the headlines on your ads, and the mark that symbolizes your company. It’s your shadow, so own it, wear it and be proud of it!!