Daily Digest: No. 2
Where do we draw the line between being a person and being a brand inside a small business?
I go back and forth so often with my opinions about this. On one hand I am the brand but on the other hand I am so much more than the brand. The brand wouldn’t be what it is without my experiences and ideas, but do all of those things need to be represented for the brand to be successful?
Today I went to a storytelling workshop inside the Being Boss community and it was so useful and thought provoking. Led by Anna Darian, we talked about how much to talk about as a brand owner and even how much is too much. Just what I needed.
Being a brand owner and figuring out how much is too much is hard. My knitting customers don’t need to see my latte or every day. Also, the flip side is that you can be too dry, too product-heavy, which is stale, uninspiring and ultimately boring.
I am not boring.
And that much I know for certain. Never have been, never will be.
However, I’m not usually one for oversharing but I am someone that under-shares. I hold back in a crowd until I have the right thing to say and sometimes that’s how I feel inside my brand. Am I saying the right thing in this crowd?
In yesterday’s post, I talked a lot about getting back out there as a blogger and communicator and what that means for me. We talked about that in the seminar, too. Why do we hold back as business owners? What are we afraid of? Judgement? Being called out? Making a mistake? Overstepping? Imposter syndrome?
I don’t know what my reasons are but I do know, from years of experience, every time I share a story or my perspective it results in more interest, more conversations, more interactions and inevitably more sales.
The moral of the story is – People don’t buy products, they buy connections. I picked up that gem from Catherine Erdly in the Resilient Retail Game Plan podcast and it’s 100% true because being a brand owner is not just about making the products and shipping it out, it’s also about building a loyal following based on your values, likes and interests to ultimately build a consistent revenue stream.
It’s a lot of learning and hard work to find that balance between sharing too much and not enough of your life inside your brand but it really comes down to the fact that we just need to keep trying!