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Why Branding Your Business is an Important Part of your Marketing Efforts
Owen: Welcome to hireyourvirtualassistant.com. My name is Owen McGab Enaohwo. On my blog I have a show where I bring on experts from various fields to come to the show. The reason being, my audience is primarily small business owners and the more people I bring in to the show to share their insights on whatever they are doing, so that I can provide that information to you for free. It is my way of saying thank you for coming to my blog.
Today, I have Bill Milnazik from Axis Visual. Bill strongly believes for the need for small business owners out there to focus on building their brand. Not only that, to increase the marketing of your brand by putting a visual face around your product be it your logo or materials that you send out there. In sense of marketing yourself, you also need to focus on building your brand. One of the ways to build your brand is focus building your brand in such a way once people see something from you, they get a sense of who you are. I thought that is something that I get on the show to talk to you guys how to build your brand and to put a visual face around your brand. I look forward to talking to you at the end of the interview.
Hi everyone, today I have Bill on the line. Bill I want you to go ahead and introduce yourself to the audience.
Bill: Hello, this is Bill Milnazik. My company is Axis Visual. We perform graphic design and marketing services for mainly small to mid size companies. Essentially building the visual face that they present to their client base.
Owen: You said building a visual face. Please explain it a little bit because some might not be able to understand it.
Bill: Sure. Companies usually do what they do really well but they usually don’t talk about their business to their client base as well. What we do, essentially with the number of years experience in this business as well as cross discipline with different types of businesses. There might be something like a logo or a website or brochure advertisement, trade show materials – anything visual. That is the face that they will present to their client base.
Now what we do is tailor it or show its most effective. There is a lot of competition out there for design and marketing. What we can do to make the company most visible is in turn will help them in the long run.
Owen: Okay. I know that in the email you sent me, you said something about how you started out by first of all, there are two sides of the story – you branding yourself and also brand the company. Let’s start with how you started out – your history how you got started out in the business and how you got to the point where you started branding yourself in your business.
Bill: Okay. I don’t want to go back to far. Both my parents, particularly my father did the same to his business in his field. I went to Art School and was introduced to design and marketing for businesses. I spent about 17 years working for another company.
Then, 13 years ago, I started building my own and opened up my company with the idea of having more variety of experiences and client types but also bringing in tailored communications at smaller budgets. I don’t have, being a small item and also an entrepreneur with a small business, am aware of that, so I try to keep up, essentially the way I phrase it is “agencies experience at studios price. That’s the kind of how I do it.
In my 13 years of experience, I have a lot of different types of clients. In the Philadelphia area, you cannot be here and not work with someone in the Pharmaceutical Area.
Owen: Yeah
Bill: I have done a lot of other things as well. Personally, I love variety. I love wrapping my brain around other demands different companies present.
Owen: So when you get a client, what is the typical process? I walk into your office and try to figure out how can you help me present me visually to my client? What is the process you go through with any new client?
Bill: First process is always the interview process. It makes fun on both sides. They interview me and I interview them. We both make sure that we feel comfortable with each other.
My goal is to get not just an understanding of their business but also an understanding of them personally. Because if they are the decision maker. What I do is essentially bring a visual creativity to the test of marketing. That is very personal.
I have to work out what I think is best for your company. But I also talk to them as an individual and find out; I talked about this with somebody earlier, what I refer to as their creative risk tolerance. It is a funny little phrase but it’s very effective because if they are risk adverse, they want to be very conservative. Now that may not be right for their particular area business or it may be perfect for their area business, it depends.
Their personal acceptance of a goal creative statement that comes into play to so I weigh out the business, the clients, their personal take, and who the decision makers are in their business. Through that, then we will talk a little bit further and I will present an estimate of the projects. If they want to move forward then we move forward.
Owen: Okay. You said you try to weigh how risks adverse they are. Can you give any specific example of a situation wherein someone came and want to do something very conservative. You had an idea that will push them to something a little bit more risk adverse and turned out better than the expected.
Bill: I think that often times happens but also my role in the first interview on finding who they are doesn’t absolutely and necessarily direct me but it’s another piece of the puzzle. When I find out how risk adverse they are, I may show one solution to it.
Normally I come up with multiple solutions and we’ll talk about them and make adjustments. It becomes more of an interactive process. The client is really part of the solution here as well. I may show them further more adventurous. For example, I feel that it is much more effective too, so I’ll talk and I’ll tell them why. In the end, I certainly have my feelings and opinions about it but it is like any service business, I am performing a service for someone or a company. They have to feel comfortable with it.
So, I will absolutely tell them the whys and the where’s I think the solution is best. But the bottom line is that they have to be comfortable too. That is part of the personality they are projecting for their company.
Owen: Yes. One of the things that stood out for me, in your email you said this social media buzz thing. I want to go back in to that statement where you said people shouldn’t get tired to wait by whole social media thing. There is something specific that you need to focus on in every business when it comes to marketing to your clients.
What are those things that you feel regardless of social media, what are those key things that you feel that every business owner must need to focus on when it comes to marketing to their clients or educating their clients for the need of their services?
Bill: Different businesses have different equations of what is right and I have experience in some areas I think. If I interview the businesses then I’ll know what areas I think will be best, the social media area is a bit funny right now because it is getting all kinds of buzz. People think it is the savior. All you have to do is social media and your business will be perfect.
Owen: Yes.
Bill: There are certain businesses that it helps and there are certain that it is less effective. Business to business marketing is less effective there. Consumer marketing depending on the product there might be more effective. That comes into play.
You have to think about who is the decision maker. Who is buying the products? How do they spend their time? If you’re pitching to a sea level company CEO or something in that area, they are not sitting there watching on twitter all day long.
Owen: Yes
Bill: Versus to somebody in a coffee shop or something. That would be more applicable prefecture. I don’t mean to dismiss it completely. I just think it is getting a lot of hype now than it warrants for a lot of businesses. I also think that it would be very interesting as it plays out in the future because it’s an area that is getting saturated really really quickly
Owen: Yes.
Bill: So if you think about how many emails that you don’t read a day. There is more and more avenues where things are coming out of that consumers. We are putting up walls to stop. The social media, I think, is getting saturated very quickly. People will just start to put up a wall and say “I don’t want to hear. I don’t want to get any information from this or that or the other thing.”
Is it valuable? Yes and it’s worth exploring depending what it is. Sometimes you create a buzz. For example, some of the viral videos up on YouTube, they are really bold statements. So if you want to do that, you really have to be bold with it in order to make a mark or create a little of a buzz that way. There is value but I think you have to look at who is the audience that is going to buy your products or service and how do you get to them. My feeling, granted because this is also my area expertise, a good solid visual brand for a company is critical. It is critical as anything else because that is the signature that people see. That is the logo, the color, the layout or whatever it is, that is the visual presence that the company brings forward. That immediately gives the impression of “it’s professional” or “it’s not professional” or it is a company I can trust or it’s too crazy. There are all these things being delivered. That’s an area that I think is important.
There are also these areas like PR, and social media, as I said. In terms of one of the prefectures before we have got online here, there are so many things like networking events, just came back from one today. They are valuable too. As a small business, you have to do all of them to some degree.
The difficulty is not to get swept up with anyone where you’re letting the others fall. As you do them all, you’ll find out which ones yield the best results. Like I said, each company is different. One company does well on social media; it might be hard on another part. It is something for small business to explore on a lot of different things, talk to a lot of people. Then see what the results are.
Owen: When you say the results, how exactly are we going to do all these things you’re talking about? How do you help your clients track their results? I’m sure that is something that they might have questions.
How am I sure that what you’re doing is giving me this input. How you go about tracking that kind of result for them?
Bill: For a small business owner, that is very difficult.
Owen: Okay.
Bill: You have companies like Coca-Cola or t hat skill; they pay all kinds of money to all kinds of tracking they can figure out. For small company, it is an expensive process.
Somewhere in the web front you can do tracking where you create another webpage and direct all your clients to that one new page. There is your portal. You can measure that. You can go online and see how many viewers you have on that page. There’s a way to do that if you want to set it up.
The database is a little bit more “trackable”. It doesn’t necessarily guarantee sales. It has to setup an infrastructure to measure that.
One of the things that I saw for years on my career is that in advertising, companies would say “How would it improve my profits? How does this layout prove to be better than that layout?” That is a really difficult thing. That can be done and it can be measured but it’s a very expensive thing to measure because you need to have focus groups. You have to bring a whole lot of research and people to conduct these focus groups. It will give you a fairly good idea what the bottom line is but it’s still most small companies can’t afford that kind of cost.
My suggestion is go with people you trust. Observe what that does to business. Everybody, particularly about the economy, wants that silver bowl, that magic thing, what one thing can I do.
Owen: Yes.
Bill: Unfortunately, there is not one. If anybody tells you there is, they are trying to sell their thing.
Owen: Yes.
Bill: It is really a lot of different pieces to it. I wish there is one thing that is perfect for business so that I can sell that.
Owen: That is a good point wherein you mentioned about the economy. So right now, as a small business owner who is trying to get the brand of the company out there, what steps should be taken to do that?
Bill: well it depends on their size and budget. Optimally they should budget some money for creating the brand and some marketing. Depending on the size of the company; that may or may not be possible. A one-person shop that is literally just starting up, often times there is no budget for that. There’s going to be a lot of their own footwork.
My question when companies what to do that themselves is a little dangerous. They are setting up their first impression. If they don’t build a good first impression they can be shooting themselves on the foot.
Owen: Yes
Bill: The other issue I am going to mention is some individuals try to do everything themselves. What is your time worth? How it is best spent? Is it more cost effective to do a task you don’t do well and then don’t do much sales or production or baking bread, if that is what your company is.
You have to be very careful about things. In the end, a brand and marketing is an investment, is a cost. If it is done well, it should strike out as an investment. A well-designed logo is something that a company can be proud of. It gives an impression even without reading a word. It gives an impression, maybe hints about what the company does and how the company thinks or what are their advantages over their competition.
That is what a designer who thinks in that way will deliver. People often had issues with designers they choose from. You want to be comfortable with them. You want to have a feeling that they understand and they have some experience in the field. That’s an interview process.
A lot of people say, “My son is doing it at school, he likes to draw, he can make my logo.” Okay. It gives an impression to a potential client. Is it the only thing? No. It is one component out of many that is involved in marketing. As far as having materials that look professional, it is an area that can make a company look viable and desirable is the more important thing.
Owen: What comes with the visual package that you usually deliver to a client?
Bill: It depends on how they communicate. Some products companies are strictly more on web. Some companies are more trade show oriented although that is decreasing. Some companies are banner ads and web presence. Some companies are more print and collateral materials to hand out to people face-to-face. It really varies. But once again, it should be driven by how they communicate to their customer base.
Owen: Yes, I see the point.
Bill: It is not a one-size-fits-all kind of solution.
Owen: The primary thing is; knowing how you present yourself to the client. It is dependent on how does your client understand the services or anything that you push to them on where they be.
Bill: Yes.
Owen: The way you push it to them is dependent on where they are right now.
Bill: That is exactly what it is.
Owen: Your clients are not the type who would be on social media, then why even bother?
Bill: You spend a lot of time and wasting time being average. Small businesses are, I know this is 1st hand, time is absolutely critical. We have to be very careful where we choose to spend our time. How we use that time to promote our business like networking meetings.
If you are spending time setting up social media, if your clients not are there, that is wasted time. If they are there, then it could be valuable time. Like you said, it’s where your clients spend their time.
The other thing to look at is competition. That is an area that I think is critical. What are they doing? Keep an eye on your competition. What are they doing? Not to say that you want to do, this is another experience where clients come to me and say, our competition is doing this so let’s do this.
Owen: Yes.
Bill: We may play in that area and expose the company in that area but not to make it look the same.
Owen: You want to be unique.
Bill: There is another purpose. Who wants to be mimic me too company? You don’t want to stand down. You want to have the confidence to be bold and make a strong statement. But observe what the client does is important too.
Owen: Okay. That’s a good way to end the interview in regards to making sure you understand your clients.
Before we go, when a small business owner comes to you, you try to understand who your clients are. What would the key things that you could say to understand what the clients are, where the clients stand, how the client want them to present themselves. What would be the key things you inquire from your clients so that it helps them to understand their clients?
Bill: That questions can be, first, who, describe your average client? Some companies it can be very specific. It might be an IT person in that middle – large companies that works for a specific server. In other companies, they may say that my client is anybody who is walking down the street and comes in to my shop and buy my loaf of bread. That’s very different but they are important questions.
Usually clients have an initial impression particularly I worked not entirely but heavily on the business to business area. That’s more of a specific niche that we are trying to decipher.
It may be something like who is your average client? What is their income? What is their gender? What’s their age? Where do they work? What do they do? Try to create a visual picture of them. If they can do that relatively well, we can build something that is surely effective for marketing to that group.
Owen: Yes. Thank you very much Bill. I’m sure my audience would want to contact you since you do primarily business to business. How can they get hold of you
Bill: Like every company, I have a website. It is axisvisual.com. Which is a probably good thing to do first because that will show anybody that is interested in what type of work I do, how I think creatively and things like that? On there is my contact information. They can contact me there.
I would be more than happy to talk to anybody. One of the things I enjoy a lot about being an entrepreneur is I learn more about different businesses. That is so much fun for me seeing what makes different businesses tick. What the product is. It is a learning process that you can’t replace with any other.
Owen: Yes. It’s like having a seat to a movie, watching how everything comes together on their end.
Bill: Exactly.
Owen: Bill, some of my audience will contact you. You can go to his website and ask him any questions that you like.
Thanks Bill.
Bill: Thanks Owen.
Owen: I hope you enjoyed the interview with Bill Milnazik. Before you go, I want to find out from you. What are you currently doing to do your brand and build a visual face to promote your brand when someone sees a marketing piece from you, they know instantly what you are all about. Go ahead and leave your comments on my blog because I want to hear from you.
Before you go, please do me a favor, I want you to join my newsletter. You can do that by clicking on the image right here on the top – the image for my ebook. When you click on it, it is going to open up a page wherein you can enter in your name and email. When you do, you would receive a copy of my free ebook entitled “The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Running a Business on a Cloud”. You will be going to receive email updates anytime I have a new blog post and when I have interviews with small business owners. Also, you will also be included into my newsletter. You would receive information regarding outsourcing tools and virtual assistants to hire and managing tips that you will find on my blog. Thank you for watching the show and please do come back.
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