🏃➡️ Chasing Too Many Ideas
🦺 Brand In Progress
🏋🏼 Strategic Hard Work
🏃➡️ Chasing Too Many Ideas
By their very nature, entrepreneurs are restless, creative people. They see things others don’t, and they have the ability to commercialize ideas.
That innate talent is what makes them entrepreneurs. But left unchecked, that ability to ideate and create can turn from an asset into a liability.
It’s an entrepreneurial trap. Instead of taking one idea and scaling it, the entrepreneur keeps chasing new ideas — the next idea. The result can be an underperforming company with many projects stuck at 80% or products and brands that never reach their full potential.
This is the tyranny of complexity. Building the infrastructure to grow an old idea isn’t exciting. It’s hard work. It’s draining. It’s fraught with management and people issues. It’s perceived as unpleasant, draining, shitty work.
Instead of dealing with the challenges of scale, the entrepreneur can scratch their creative itch by starting new things. But that’s the trap!
Before launching anything new, take a hard look at your product and service portfolio and ask, “If we focused all of our efforts on [define the product or business unit] for the next [12, 24 or 36] months, what would it mean for our business?”
Chances are you can grow your existing lines of business a lot more without launching anything new. This can feel counterintuitive for the entrepreneur, but it can be the difference between growing the business and having dozens of projects stuck at 80%.
One Stat to Watch
40%
Only 40% of developed products reach the market. Among those that do, only 60% generate revenue, according to the Marketing Research Association
🦺 Brand In Progress
Your brand is a work in progress, and so is mine. So too are the best brands in the world.
Brilliant brands aren’t perfect. They have quirks and flaws. They are constantly evolving, but that’s what makes them interesting and memorable.
We’re naturally drawn to quirks. If you've watched the TV show The Big Bang Theory, you’ll immediately know the character Dr. Sheldon Cooper. He’s a brilliant yet obsessive guy with a laundry list of character flaws.
For example, Sheldon’s OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) drives him to knock on a door in a distinct pattern of threes, and then call out the person’s name:
Knock, knock, knock, “Penny…”
Knock, knock, knock, “Penny…”
Knock, knock, knock, “Penny…”
The behavior is odd, but it’s memorable. It’s hard to forget Sheldon.
Quirks have an impressive pull on your memory. You notice things don’t fit your expectations, and that makes them even more memorable. This is a powerful branding lesson. Quirks make your brand unforgettable.
Your brand is in a constant state of evolution and growth, and the second you stop working on it is the second it starts to die.
Don’t be afraid of your imperfections. Showcase your quirks. This can be in your sense of humor, your team, your vision, your authenticity. Your quirks make your brand unforgettable.
🏋🏼 Strategic Hard Work
The branding process is often associated with a moment:
- A breakthrough idea
- A new name or new brand identity
- A new strategy
These moments are visceral and powerful, but they’re not brand building.
The real truth is far less magical. Brand building is a process where you make small incremental improvements day after day to serve your customers just a little bit better. It’s grinding.
Venture capitalist Fred Wilson — who has backed some of the hottest tech startups such as Twitter and Etsy — writes, “Grinding isn’t very satisfying. It is hard to stand up in front of everyone and say ‘we are going to fix things around here bit by bit with a lot of hard work.’ Big flashy moves are an easier sell most of the time. But they don’t work nearly as well and are prone to complete and abject failure.”
It’s hard work to improve your business bit by bit. But your brand is directly tied to how well your business functions. If you’re not grinding on the hard things that matter, you’re not building a strong brand.
But what matters? Without a clear strategy, the hard work of brand building is almost futile. You can be overwhelmed and busy but not actually make the changes that advance your business.
So it’s not just grinding, it’s strategic grinding!
Working with dozens of clients over the years, I have found that traditional or conventional approaches to branding are flawed. They are too front-loaded. Too much effort is placed on ideation and brand development, and not enough is focused on the strategic hard work of execution.
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