Gained in Drops, Lost in Buckets.
The Trappings of Value and What It Is: Part 8
A start…
Kevin Plank, Billionaire CEO of Under Armour once said that:
“Brands are all about trust. That trust is built in drops and lost in buckets.”
It’s beyond just brands and businesses. It comes back to the heart of most businesses. A fact that people just hate to admit. The idea that most businesses (if not all of them) are “people businesses.”
They need real people to pay real money to purchase their goods and services. And that can get tricky sometimes when you want to automate everything and literally try to take “people” out of the equation.
But I digress.
I want to continue this ongoing series of essays that I’ve been writing about the subject of value. The focus today?
Brand Equity.
Before I go any further into it though, let’s set a control here so that we are all on the same page. I’ve defined value in these last several articles as:
The importance, worth, or usefulness of something.
And when you see me talking about Brand Equity today, I want you to know exactly what I mean. I am talking about the following definition:
Brand Equity = The commercial value that derives from consumer perception of the brand name of a particular product or service, rather than from the product or service itself.
So in layman’s terms, Brand Equity is essentially value that is based on what the consumer thinks about your product or service. It’s based on perception.
Now, if like me, you understand that the value of a thing is always based on the perception of the market you are aiming to sell that thing to…
…then you can see how something like Brand Equity can be very important, indeed, to your online success. And hopefully, you can see how it is directly tied to the subject of value.
But the real question, and the one I want to focus on answering today is how can you increase your brand equity, thereby increasing the value of everything you do in the marketplace?
Let me give you some ways to do it now, and again…this isn’t some B.S. Chat GPT special or some dumb thing I read in a book. This is just my real life experience here, being delivered to you on a silver platter.
So let’s get in…
5 Ways I Have Increased My Brand Equity
One) Consistency
Consistency is like that little bit of advice that your parents always gave you when you were a teenager like “get enough sleep” or “eat your vegetables” and it sounded so cliché and over-talked about that you just had to ignore them.
Then you wake up in your early thirties crying the blues because you are burned out from not sleeping enough at night, and your fat from eating too much junk food.
And what do we think?
“Damn, I should have listened to my parents when I was a kid.”
So then you join a gym or pay for a weight loss program, and now you have some guru telling you essentially the same thing your parents told you for years.
The fact of the matter is, consistency in what you do matters. YOu need to show up regularly with consistent messaging, consistent customer support, consistent publishing of free content and paid content. You need to be that rock upon which the stormy weather crashes but does not crumble.
Because what happens when you keep showing up day after day, week after week, year after year, with the same messages and rock solid consistency…
…is that you start earning people’s respect and trust. But I bet if you searched your heart you already knew that. You didn’t need me to tell you. Think about the people you like to buy from.
I bet a lot of them are people who tend to be very consistent in what they do. We like new stuff, but we also like consistent stuff. It makes us feel comfortable and everybody likes to feel comfortable.
So commit to being consistent with how you run things.
Two) Dialed in USP
I’m talking about a Unique Selling Proposition. The essence of what makes your product or business (in this case) different from your competitors.
Why should people care about what you have going on?
How is that any different than what these guys over here have going on?
If you have this dialed in, then you can shape the narrative of how people view and see your business. If you don’t have it dialed in, then people will start to shove you into a box of their own design.
People love to shove things in boxes and categorize them. That’s just the way it is. Either you tell them where you should be categorized, or you let them haphazardly do it themselves with little to no thought given.
Examples:
Tesla Electric Car Company: Cutting-edge electric vehicle technology with a high performance, long-range battery, and an advanced autopilot system.
Toms Shoes: For every pair of shoes purchased, a pair is donated to a person in need.
Dyson Vacuums: Innovative design and technology that offer superior suction power and filtration.
There are many ways to dial in a great USP for your business. And it’s not always easy to do so. I’ve known businesses that have actually made a lot of money without having one very dialed in. However…
…you’ll do far better if you work on it. Also, the more competitive your niche is, the more important this becomes.
But ultimately, the USP for your business will contribute to the increasing of your brand equity for the simple reasons that:
you are now specialized, which always raises perceived value
And you are now dictating the narrative surrounding what your business is.
Three) Longevity
Longevity goes hand in hand with consistency. But the fact of the matter is you can increase your brand equity just by staying around longer. Surviving. Weathering storms. Those things mean something to everyone.
We all respect a survivor. On a subconscious level at the bare minimum we will treat a business that has been around longer differently than how we treat a new venture.
A survey by Edelman Trust Barometer found that 59% of consumers trust brands with a long history more than newer brands.
Another survey by Edelman reports that 79% of Gen Z say it’s more important than ever to trust the brands they buy, more than any other generation surveyed…
…but let’s be honest. YOu didn’t need me to tell you that. I bet you already knew that we all tend to trust and want to buy from businesses that have been around longer.
They exude a feeling of stability and reliability. That’s just the way it is. So with this one, all you need to do is survive. And yes, it’s okay to pivot. Brands pivot sometimes. That’s just the way it is.
You control the perception of the pivot with your marketing. But the brand equity remains intact.
Four) Logos, Catch Phrases, and the like…
Not too much I need to say about this one. Obviously, a good logo is always a powerful piece of marketing that people will associate with your brand.
The same goes for catchphrases and slogans. It’s good to have these things because they further build your brand identity. However…
…in the world of brand equity…
What you do will determine the value of these slogans and catchphrases and logos.
I see these like assets that you install that will amplify your brand equity as you grow. Important, but mercilessly tied to how well you are handling the equity of your brand.
Bottom line with these? They are amplifiers. Have them. Don’t expect them to do the heavy lifting when it comes to building brand equity.
Did Nike grow more brand equity from its Swoosh logo? I think not. Did the logo amplify the brand, after it was already becoming a household name? Absolutely.
Five) Celebrity by Association
When you associate a celebrity with your brand, you gain status and authority by mere association with that individual. This raises brand equity.
Now this doesn’t have to be a major celebrity. Listen…
Let’s say you are starting a brand new information product business in the weight loss industry. So you decide to interview an author in that niche. Now maybe this author is not very well-known but they have a following. Maybe they have an email list of a couple thousand people.
Well, you have an email list of ZERO people, so this author is a little ahead of you. They aren’t some kind of household name. They are just one author in a sea of authors…
…but they do have some influence, and to the 2,000 people on their email list…
…they are special.
And if those 2,000 people see your interview with that author, then they will see you as a little special as well. That’s the way it works. That's celebrity by association. And what I’m telling you is…
…this simple act of interviewing, being seen with, taking pictures with, associating with, name dropping…
…these things can increase your brand equity. If you associate with Person A, and the prospect knows person A, and they’ve bought things from person A, and you are okay with Person A…
…then maybe they will be okay with you too.
Many times throughout my online marketing career (spanning over 10 years now) I have interviewed people in the marketing world who were more well known than I was.
And every time I have done so, it has always helped me in ways of increasing my brand equity, raising my authority, building my status, increasing the size of my email list, etc.
Lastly…
Lastly, I need to give you a simple way to measure if it has worked or not. I want to keep this very simple for you too. No tricky analytics to measure. No big data to decipher here.
Use these tactics for a bit, and then raise your prices. If people are receptive to your raised prices and you are making more money, then you will know very quickly that it worked, and you have raised your brand equity.
If you raise your prices, and all the sudden it’s a ghost town. Nobody is buying anything, then you know you still have some work to do in the brand equity department.
Now are there other ways to measure brand equity? You bet. More sophisticated ways to track progress? Of course. But at the end of the day, your business lives and dies by the money it generates.
This is a simple way to cut to the heart of the matter. I call it the wallet test.
In Conclusion…
This idea of Brand Equity is a deep subject. We could write 10 more articles on this alone…but we won’t today.
For now let me just wrap it up by saying all of the things I have mentioned here to raise your brand equity…
…all of you can do these things. It completely comes down to will and determination.
You are the only one who can decide you will not be denied.
That’s all I got!
Kam