How Building Your Brand is Like Building an Engine

When we work with new clients one of our primary goals is:

Let there be as few, yet crucial, conversations as possible so that we can do for you in weeks what it has taken you months (even years) to attempt without us.

Thus, we use a specific process that is much like a race car team: Picture yourself as the expert driver. We, as your chief mechanic, will rally your team (internally and externally) so that each role is clear, there's no duplication AND you only need to have one crucial conversation (rather than 5 separate ones involving the same topic) in order to know that all systems are a go and you're ready to step into the driver's seat.

Step 1: Empower Your Chief Mechanic

You, as the Expert of What You Do, are the Driver. We, as your outsourced brand department, are your Chief Mechanic. Everyone else on your advisory team will be one of the Specialist Mechanics under our chief direction. For Example A wealth adviser group tasked us with the mission to develop and launch the name, words, symbols, colors, photography and strategy that would become their logo, tagline, flyers, stationary, website and market launch. Our Chief Mechanic team consisted of our creative director, project manager, copy writer, graphic designer and photographer. Their Driver team consisted of one principle and their marketing assistant. Their Specialist Mechanics team consisted of their intellectual property attorney, broker compliance, broker website developer, and printer.

You can imagine the coordination.

Step 2: Get Buy-in from ALL Parties

So you as the Driver know that every second counts and that much of that is due to what your Chief Mechanic and Team can do to empower you. One loose bolt and the entire race is lost! Back to Our Example Our wealth adviser client made the request of their internal and external teams to work with and under our direction. We brought all parties together for an initial springboard session. They appointed their marketing assistant as their point of contact (to handle all the minute details that no one else needed to know about) and we trained them to fulfill the digital stationary creation process. We coordinated with their attorney and compliance to determine at what point in the design process it made sense to bring them in to the conversation. We babysat their website developer through the user experience & coding process and their printer through the stationary production process. We brought key experts together ONLY when it was time to make a decision. We made sure there was no duplication of efforts as much as was humanly possible.

Know when to keep your hands off the wheel (or at least out of the engine!).

Step 3: Let Your Team Lead the Way

As a race car driver, you have expert skill at making that one key move that will win the race. But, you know you can only do that with the assistance of your road coach, chief mechanic and team of specialists. Back to Our Example By setting us up to lead the process, our wealth adviser client kept their focus on what they do best: They stayed abreast of the often times volatile market; They took great care of their existing clients; They built relationships with new prospects. We were able to then: Take the pressure off them and get the materials they wanted when they needed them; Empower them to generate conversations that ultimately closed more prospects (and thus hit their quarterly goal to double from last quarter) Put them in a strong position at the negotiation table when it came time to merge with another wealth firm