Small business brands

If you were to survey all the business literature out there, you could be forgiven for thinking that only big companies have a brand. All the case studies, examples and stories about brand inevitably focus on the top end of the marketplace – the big “names”.

This is dangerous for a number of reasons.

Firstly, it sets up the idea that somehow mass market awareness is a criteria of brand success. Secondly, it skews perception about the role of brand.

There are 1.9 million small businesses here in Australia and many million more around the world. And there is a dearth of information about how a small business should go about building a brand and the value it brings to the organisation.

Let me start by saying that if you have customers who purchase your products or services, then you have a brand. If you have employees who come to work with you every day, then you have a brand. If you have partners and suppliers who support your business, then you have a brand.

You just might not know what it is (yet).

In my work with SME organisations, I often find myself having the same conversation stuck on repeat. The central theme I hear over and over is that brand costs too much money and is something that they will do later, when they are bigger.

So let’s start by exploring the idea that brand is something you have to pay others to do for you. The fact is that everything you do in your business has an impact on what your brand is and the vast majority of it you don’t pay anyone else for (also called the day-to-day running of your business).

You can be deliberate about it or you can leave it to happenstance, either way it will still be the most important influence on your brand.

The things you might pay others to do for you (brand markers like your logo, your marketing materials, etc) are just a few on a very long list, and they aren’t even the most important (see my blog last week where I talk about the role of brand markers).

Everything I have written about brand on this blog over the past few years applies equally to every company. I don’t care if your revenue is 100k, 1,000k or 10,000k – your brand is the result of what you believe and what all your actions show.

No matter your size, the foundations of brand are the same. The things that make a strong brand are the same. Sure the scale and application will vary – the bigger you are the more complicated things get and brand is no different, so all the more reason to get started while you are smaller and can more easily control things.

So just between us, I am working on a small business brand project, capturing stories from SMEs that are living and building their brands. Some of those stories will show up here in coming months and all will eventually land in an eBook on SME brands because I believe it’s time we start to dispel this mythology that brand is something only the big boys can have.

There are great small business brands out there that can be a lesson and inspiration to everyone, so if you know of a business that is living their brand, post their name in the comments.

Thanks and see you next week.

Michel Hogan is a Brand Advocate. Through her work with Brandology here in Australia and in the United States, she helps organisations recognise who they are and align that with what they do and say, to build more authentic and sustainable brands. She also publishes the Brand thought leadership blog – Brand Alignment.