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Transcript

Beyond the Hype: Why Early Branding Doesn't Matter (As Much as You Think) · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. Today I'm a little bit pressed
• 0:05
  for time, so those of you who prefer the shorter episodes
• 0:07
  might be really happy about this one.
• 0:10
  So today we're going to continue on the conversation that we
• 0:12
  started yesterday, talking to people who have limited business
• 0:16
  experience and who want practical guidance on or what to
• 0:20
  look out for as first time entrepreneurs.
• 0:22
  And I had come up with a bunch of stuff that I think those of
• 0:25
  you who are new to the game need to know.
• 0:28
  And yesterday we went into some detail about 30 minutes worth
• 0:33
  about why your business name is not as important as you think.
• 0:35
  So you shouldn't spend too much time on it if this your first
• 0:39
  time of listening to the show. After you're done listening to
• 0:41
  this, skip back one episode and then you will get caught up to
• 0:45
  speed on some of my ideas around why the business name is not
• 0:49
  that important. But even if you insist that you
• 0:53
  must have your business name and all of that ironed out before
• 0:55
  you begin your business journey, I have some really helpful tips
• 0:58
  and tricks about what you can do to make sure that you start off
• 1:02
  with a fairly competent name. But bear in mind that things
• 1:06
  change. The name might change, all kinds
• 1:08
  of things might change in the future.
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  It's just a normal part of business because a lot of the
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  brands that we know and love today didn't start off with the
• 1:15
  same name or with the same brand or colour or all sorts of
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  things. Now today, the second thing that
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  we're going to go into is we're going to look at why your
• 1:23
  branding is not as important as you think.
• 1:25
  And so you shouldn't be spending too much time on that.
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  This is a nuance point of view. So for those of you who are
• 1:32
  public relations and brand specialist, people, don't stop
• 1:35
  listening to the podcast right now.
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  Just wait and hear some detail about, or some nuance rather
• 1:40
  about what I mean by that. And then in future episodes,
• 1:44
  we're going to look at why you shouldn't worry too much about
• 1:47
  protecting your business idea. Don't worry, lawyers, we will
• 1:50
  get to that. That is also a nuanced
• 1:52
  conversation. Then I also tried to buzz that
• 1:55
  myth. That is no such thing as a
• 1:57
  business as a service, as a product that sells itself.
• 2:00
  We'll get into that in more detail in the future.
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  And then I also tried to open up the eyes of the newbie to the
• 2:07
  fact that business is a team sport.
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  Even if you are a lifestyle business owner, even if you want
• 2:13
  to do a cottage industry as people say it, you know, so like
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  today I went to go and buy a car for breakfast.
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  And that's the cottage industry because of the woman who does
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  it. But I mean, she fries, her
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  oldest daughter is there, her son is chopping the firewood.
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  So I hope you guys have been in to get the picture that I'm
• 2:30
  trying to paint that even for lifestyle businesses, cottage
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  businesses, small business, whatever it is you want to call
• 2:36
  it, business will always be a team sport.
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  So it's best for us to realize that and start trying to
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  anticipate and plan for what the business is going to look like
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  in the future. So this whole thing of self-made
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  this, self-made that solo, this solo that, please, it's a myth.
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  Get that out of your mind. So today we'll just go straight
• 2:54
  into why your branding is not as important as you think and why
• 2:56
  you shouldn't spend too much time on that.
• 2:59
  Now, for you public relations and brand people, what I am not
• 3:02
  saying is, OK, no, sorry. How do I put it anyway?
• 3:06
  I'm not saying that brand is not important because branding is
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  important. But The thing is, in the early
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  days, you don't know enough about your target audience or
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  about your marketplace or about all the defining decisions and
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  things that you need to decode. You don't know enough about all
• 3:24
  these things to determine what your brand should be.
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  When we're looking at brand these days, a lot of times we're
• 3:31
  all looking at our favorite brands.
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  We forget that we are looking at a finished product.
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  We're looking at something that has had time to evolve and for
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  all kinds of creative and business decisions to go into
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  the process. So we're looking at the finished
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  product and it got it gets lots of people thinking that it's
• 3:44
  possible to start off the business with the finished
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  product and that's not how it works.
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  So there's a couple of things that we need to figure out in
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  the early days before we get to the whole thing of coming up
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  with our definitive, you know, classic forever, all time brand.
• 4:01
  So for those of you who are new to the game and you're thinking
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  of getting into business, stop spending all this time trying to
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  guess about brand positioning. Brand positioning is not
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  something you guess. Brand positioning is something
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  that you figure out. You go into the market, you try
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  to sell, you figure out who your ideal customers are.
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  You get a sense of who the the competition is.
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  That is what determines how you position yourself in the market.
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  So you don't just figure out brand positioning because you
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  have an MBA and your brother has an MBA and maybe your sister has
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  an MBA. And then three of you sit down
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  and then come up with the best, whatever you can do that
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  strategizing exercise. But still it has to be battle
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  tested. People have to go out into the
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  field and then that's how you figure out ultimately what the
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  best brand positioning is going to be.
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  So stop guessing about your colours, your logos, your fonts,
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  your brand voice and all what not because you don't know all
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  these variables yet. That's also the reason why I say
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  don't hire a brand specialist early is for the same reason.
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  So what you should do is take the time out to validate your
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  business idea. Be sure that this thing is
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  profitable, that people want to buy whatever it is that you're
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  selling. Get a sense of who your ideal
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  customers are. Get a feel of the market, get a
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  feel of the competition, who has larger market share?
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  What are the kind of things that are out there?
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  Who are the other players in the market?
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  Then in interacting with your customers, you're going to be
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  able to now figure out what tone of voice works or what
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  communication channels work best with which kind of customers or
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  with other kind of stakeholders. Now it's all this data that is
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  going to inform what your future, your ideal, your optimum
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  branding should be. When you have figured all this
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  out, then you can now bring in a brand specialist, a designer, a
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  brand whisperer, a brand whatever, a public relations
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  guru or everything or whatever. When you figured out all these
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  things, you're going to get the best out of these kinds of
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  specialists after you figured out all these early things,
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  because now you have all the answers to the questions that
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  they need about tone of voice and colour palettes and brand
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  associations and then all of that.
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  And if you're not convinced, go on Google, do a little search
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  about your favorite brands and you will see that your favorite
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  brands have changed over time. The logo has changed, the colour
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  has changed, the fonts have changed.
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  For some people, the name has changed.
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  So your branding, what you're trying to do in the beginning is
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  not the make or break foundational element that you
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  think it is. It just is not so.
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  But please use common sense with all these things.
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  I'm saying if you decide to go into business, let's say you're
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  a wedding florist and you call your business name crappy poo
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  Poo and then you make your brand colours brown, then you know
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  that is poor decision making. So I'm not saying if you're a
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  wedding florist, call your business name crappy poo poo and
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  use brown, brown colors. That's not what I'm saying.
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  So please use some common sense. What I'm advocating is this,
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  make the best decision, the quickest decision that you can
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  for now. And then figure out who your
• 6:56
  ideal customers are at the price point where they hang out, how
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  they'd like to be spoken to while the other players, you
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  know, all these sorts of things. You figure that out and then
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  later on, you're going to be able to come up with the best
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  brand positioning and colours and palettes and everything that
• 7:10
  is going to work for you. So stop agonising, take action
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  now, get robust data from the market, use that to inform your
• 7:19
  business decisions and then you'll be fine.
• 7:21
  So that's all for today. Connect with me on WhatsApp.
• 7:23
  The phone number is 08064662140 and the country code is +234.
• 7:28
  For those of you who are not Nigerian, excuse me and then
• 7:32
  also connect with me on LinkedIn, the name is Tavish
• 7:34
  Shima Aydi. You can confirm the spelling of
• 7:36
  my name and the e-mail address from the link.
• 7:38
  We're currently listening to this episode.
• 7:40
  Thank you very much for your time and attention.
• 7:41
  I hope I have been able. Yes, I have 7 minutes.
• 7:44
  That's good. So I'll catch you guys at the
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  next episode.