How can a smaller, fast-growth company pursue personal branding? Datatec Industries -- a company that has done a good job with all three types of branding -- provides one example. Datatec, an installation company that does low-voltage electrical wiring to support computer point-of-sale equipment, found that its installation crews weren't particularly welcome on many sites. If the site was new construction, they were in the way. If it was an existing business, they were in the way.
The company itself is very much into customer satisfaction, and it asks customers to rate the crews after each project. We targeted one crew, checked its ratings, and six weeks later we put its members in uniforms -- shirts and hats with logos. Without any other change in personnel or procedures, their customer-satisfaction ratings increased. (Crew members may even have performed somewhat better because of their own pride in their personal brand.)
A product or service brand centers on the specialness of the particular product and/or service you bring to the market. Often, companies wrap a product in a special service so it will stand out from similar products. A highly visible example is Mary Kay Cosmetics.
Think about what it is that my wife buys from Mary Kay. If you say cosmetics, you're wrong. What she buys is the promise of beauty. How was that packaged? She was told that someone would come to her house to provide a facial and apply makeup, and at the end she would feel and look prettier than she'd ever felt and looked before. And that's exactly what happened.
At the conclusion of the process, she said, How can I feel and look this way again? They said, You need this bag of goop. And she bought that bag of cosmetics. And therein lies the profit vehicle again and again for Mary Kay. The brand is specific -- not cosmetics, but beauty.
Or how about Automatic Data Processing? It came into a data-processing world that was already filled with players. How could ADP's managers ever believe they could create a shelf-of-the-mind opportunity by going to big companies -- ones that were already doing business with companies like Electronic Data Systems -- and saying, We want to handle your data processing. No way to get on the shelf. No way to pull EDS off it.
They said, We'll do it differently. We'll have a specialty brand. Not all kinds of data processing, just payroll-data processing. Because we've learned it's an art form. So they said to customers, We've invested our money in creating the expertise necessary to understand that art form, package it, and bring it to you cost-effectively. Wouldn't it be in your best interest to at least take a look?
Shelf-space acquisition, my friends. Product and service brand.
A market brand creates brand identity through the special group of people you decide to sell to. Both Cadillac and Mercedes-Benz are examples of market branding. When you've become something in America, then you do business with them.
Generally speaking, for growing companies, market brand is the easiest of the brands, the most accessible and least disruptive. Look at your client list. Where are the markets of greatest opportunity? What do they need most, and could you possibly present yourself as bringing specialized expertise to that sector?
Or think of all the different emerging industry sectors out there. Which one could have an application for you? And could you describe what you offer in your promotional brochures, in your mailers? Not "We do all things for all people," but "We are specialists in this industry."
To support your market brand, research your end-user's industry: its growth, future, fears, and goals. And then carefully wrap your brand around whatever you discover. You don't talk about generic applications, you talk about specific applications, using the industry's parlance and perspectives.
It took me a while to learn that. I no longer say, What do you want? -- we'll be there in the morning. We still do training. But it's marketing and sales consulting and training. And it's not for everyone. Only for companies forced to market products and services identical to others in a competitive marketplace -- or products so similar that the end-users perceive them as identical.
* * *
Somewhere among these three potential brands -- personal, product or service, or market -- lies your brand future. The highest degree of branding effectiveness, I might add, takes place when you align specialized products or services with specialized markets. Take Hyatt Legal Services. It provides prepackaged, low-cost legal services specifically to middle-to low-income end-users who would otherwise be denied access to legal help. You wouldn't dream of going to Hyatt, and Hyatt's customers wouldn't dream of going to your lawyer. It's a specialized service to a specialized market.
You may be afraid that branding will limit your opportunities, that you'll back yourself into the wrong niche. If that's how you feel, don't be afraid to test-market your brand or multiple brand opportunities in specific, finite markets. In any case, before investing your precious capital in brochures and promotional pieces, make certain your brand-identity direction has been clearly established.
As you frame your brand identity, focus on opportunity markets rather than on market opportunities. Opportunity markets are those that have the capacity to be benevolent to your brand in the future in terms of strong growth, positioning, margin opportunity, and value-added pricing. (Take it from me, buyers like The Home Depot and Wal-Mart Stores will never pay value-added prices.) Look at the markets that are currently paying your rent, and determine what their future is. You may have to make strategic shifts to align with industries that are forecast to grow.
Along those lines, Wayne Gretzky may have said it best in a recent television interview. A reporter was asking him why he was the greatest hockey player alive. You're not the biggest, the reporter said, you're not the strongest, not the fastest, yet everybody says you're the greatest. Gretzky's reply was along these lines: "Well, you know, I'm a little surprised that you haven't picked it up already. Because to me it's quite obvious. When I get on the ice and play begins, everyone else on the ice goes where the puck is. Me? I go where the puck is going to be."
So my wish for you is that you use all your professional, personal, and emotional resources, and direct them so that throughout the '90s you and your company's brand identity find yourselves not where the puck is, but where the puck is going to be.
* * *
William R. 'Max' Carey Jr. is founder and chief executive of Corporate Resource Development Inc. (CRD), in Atlanta. In 1987 his company was #395 on the Inc. 500 list of the fastest-growing private companies in America. Two of his colleagues at CRD, Rebecca Holdren Ball and Sam Bowers, assisted him with this article.
* * *
