Creating Authentic Connections with Your Brand

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Welcome back to CBG Insiders. This is your host, Justin Gerard, and I am welcoming back one of your favorite guests to the show. Paul Percyk is back with us, our creative director here at Jekyll and Hyde, to. To continue our discussion on the organizing idea that we started in our last episode. So to kick things off, Paul, if you could possibly, for some of the listeners who. Who may not have heard the last episode, could you just give a brief summary of what an organizing idea is?

Yeah. Although brevity has never been my strong point, I'll do the best I can. You know, essentially what we talked about last time was the fact that an organizing idea, when done correctly and established, sort of becomes the guidepost, the sort of umbrella idea by which all things hang. And so if you, if, you know, if you follow the correct sort of path to get there and you understand these sort of strategic pillars about your brand and about your audience, then you can come up with an idea that all campaigns will live under. And that's what we call the organizing idea. That's probably the simplest way of explaining it.

Yeah, absolutely. And again, I think the word in a phrase that you used in our last episode that always resonate, and I think it resonated with a lot of our listeners, was the organizing idea is that North Star for all communication, for the brand. So that's the guiding light, right, that all messaging comes from. So you've created this. I said this guiding, this guidepost that now you know how to communicate no matter who the audience is that you're speaking to, no matter what the product you're talking about, and no matter what the touch point is in which you're engaging in the audience, you have this guiding light that can help you, that can help drive that execution. And yeah, it's great continuity. Yeah, it's.

It is. That's a good. It's true north is what it is. That's a good way of putting it. There's, you know, when you. When you've nailed it, you know it, and it's a. It's a really good feeling because then you know that there's nothing you can do wrong as long as you keep your canoe pointed, you know, to. To true north. And then, you know, like the old adage of if everyone's rowing in the same direction, then, you know, you can't lose.

Absolutely. So. So what we wanted to do today is we want to really start talking and digging deeper in this idea. So we have this. This guy with North Star, which sounds great, right? Well, okay, well, how do I find it? How do I create this North Star? Because it sounds like a really cool thing, right? So what we wanted to talk about today is where this starts is by understanding your brand, understanding your brand identity. That's where it all begins. It starts with home. Right. So where I wanted to kind of kick things off is I guess at first, right, in this discussion as we're talking about, you know, getting to this organizing idea. What, what do we mean when we say understand your brand and what your brand identity is? What, what does that mean?

Well, there's, there's some fundamental things that need to be reckoned with, I suppose is the best way of, of saying it. It's a painful process if you haven't done it. But, you know, drawing from the Simon Sinek sort of method of, of knowing who you are and why you exist, you can, you can understand why someone should care, right? That that's the next step. And so if you, if you, if you get those foundational things correct, right, you understand why you exist, you understand how you're different and you know, your free space and then you understand what it is that your brand is positioning, right, Then your, your sort of foundational identity doesn't come into question.

Okay.

And what, what I've seen on, on a number of different occasions is where brands or, or clients or, you know, products, I guess products might not be the, mostly brands, right? When brands come and they say, hey, you know, I'm trying to sell this thing, this really cool campaign. We did this awesome, amazing stuff, but it just, it just doesn' not resonating with people. And it's because they don't really know who they are, right? And so if they don't know who they are, then they're going to sort of flap in the breeze until they land on something that might or might not resonate. Excuse me. And that might or might not scale. And so if you do the work to, to really dig into who you are and why you exist, then, then you know, all things can flow from there. And when we're talking about a brand identity, you know, those fundamental sort of foundational understandings about your brand or about your business go deeper than just what you're selling. So that's why I say it's painful because you have to look in the mirror and you have to, like you said, you have to, you have to sort of reckon with the fact that this, that this thing that you might have thought about your brand just might not be true. And that's a hard thing to do because, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of the clients that we deal with and that, you know, come to Jekyll and Hyde for help. You know, they start something because they're passionate about it, and they start something because they feel like there's a need for this out in the, out in the world. And it usually comes from a place of personal experience with whatever the problem is. But sometimes, most of the time, it doesn't go deep enough.

Right.

Because what I need to do as a consumer or as a customer, whatever you want to call it, I need to connect with that reason why you exist. And everyone that works for your business needs to understand and also work for that same true north purpose, which then will be reflected in an organizing idea once you've established some of those, those sort of foundational messaging systems. And so, you know, when we're talking about brand identity, you have to start with why you exist. You know, who you are and why you exist. Why do your feet hit the floor in the morning? And I always like to. I always like to investigate that with the brands that I work with on a very surface level at first, because I like to dip my toe in the water and see, you know, what their appetite is for, you know, for going through that exercise, but also subtly trying to pull some of those things out of them, you know, and then at the end of the day, if they just don't, you know, if they're digging their heels in, then I just have to, you know, reach in and rip it out of them sometimes.

Well, well. And so I, I wanna, I wanna back up because. So there's a couple things here that, that I heard you say that I want to unpack one of them. And so we'll bring the listeners through here.

Sure.

So one of them was you keep saying, you know, you need to understand who you are and why you exist. Well, okay, so let's. The question of who you are, like how. What a massive question to ask that has so many layers that I want to dig into. But I think the more practical place to start gets back to where I think you kind of ended, which was making sure that when you're talking about your brand is knowing the difference between what you do and why you do it. Yeah, right. And. And again, you mentioned Simon Sinek, and I think that's something that really rings true. Right. Because yes, a lot of entrepreneurs, especially entrepreneurs. Right, you're right, they saw a problem whether they personally experienced it, whether they saw an opportunity in the marketplace that nobody saw but it starts with they saw a problem that they believe they could solve. Yeah, right. And many times that's enough. Like, hey, I've got the problem, I've got the best solution for it. People are going to want to go buy this thing. Right, but taking that extra step. But, okay, but, but why does it matter? Okay, so what's the, what's the true results that's driving the, the activation for the solution? Because, you know, as we talk about it. Right, let's talk about the. And I think an example everyone can understand. I want to lose weight.

Sure.

Okay, great. So why do you want to lose weight? And everybody's gonna have a different answer. Yeah, right. And it could be anywhere from, I want to look great during bathing suit season. Why do you want to look great during bathing suit? Because I want to get a date. Okay. Why do you want to get a date? Well, I don't. I feel like I'm missing love in my life. Okay, so why do you feel like. Right, so it's getting to the roots. Because that root is, is what you're referring to, why you exist. And that's the root that's going to permeate everything that you do. But like you said many times, what I've even experienced is that we stop at. Well, why I do it is because this weight is an issue, obesity is an issue, and I've got a solution for it.

Right, okay.

But that doesn't connect to my truth.

Well, yeah, Justin, you're hinting at. Not hinting. You've said it. The way I usually explain it is, you know, there's. When you're a kid and you are sort of wide eyed and innocent and you're trying to understand things and you keep asking the question, why, you know, and why does this, why is this mom? Why is this mom? Why is this mom? And she keeps giving answers and answers and answers, but it's not, it's not quite good enough.

Right.

Because what the kid is looking for is they're looking to connect with the actual, like the thing.

Right.

The reason, the, that, that core, that nugget of, of the reason behind it. Right. And then jokingly I always say it's like the moment when you've annoyed the crap out of her so much that she turns around and says, because God said so. And then like the question, nowhere else to go. Right, right, exactly. There's nowhere else to go. And so then the question right before the one that you just asked is probably. Or the answer right before the question that you just Asked was probably the, the actual reason why. Right? Again, jokingly say that, but it's kind of the process that, that we have to go through to get to the, to the nugget of things. In fact, we just had this discussion today with someone, and it should be noted that it's much easier to try to figure out why you, like, let's say you're an entrepreneur and you've created this thing, right? And I ask this giant question of who are you and why do you exist? And it's, you know, the immediate response is, I have to have an answer for that question. And so that person will start to try to figure it out. And it's okay to say why? I don't really know if you actually don't. But the. What am I trying to say? The better place to start is to start with the personal, right? Because there are different things, like you said, that will drive each person individually to try to accomplish something like losing weight. What is the motivation behind that? And so if you're a business owner, start looking inside your own self, not your business, and that's going to sort of, that's going to at least guide the reasons why you started this company or started this product or tried to fulfill this need, because innately, it's going to come from you because there's as much you in that product as anyone, right? And so if you've created this product that helps lose weight.

Right?

Let's use that as an example. So if, If Justin wants to lose weight because he wants to look great in a bathing suit, okay, great. But why? Right? Well, if you eventually get to. Because I'm lonely and I'm starting to feel like, you know, my life isn't. Isn't going the way that it should. And I know that I'm destined to be with some, whatever it might be. You get to like the nugget of what it is, then whatever messaging comes from, the brand is going to have to pay that off, right? And so if you know who you are and why you started this company or this brand, you can speak, you can connect with that person through values, right? Like, I think I said this. I'm not sure if I said this in the last podcast, but I know I've said it to you. You know, hey, do you club Baby Seals?

No.

Well, neither do I. So we can be friends, right? We can start that relationship from a place of common, common, common purpose. And so the brand identity and having, having that foundational understanding of who you are is what, is what will Initially attract someone to even try to find out who you are and what you do. Right. But they have to feel. Right, they have to feel like this is a brand that I can get on board with more and more, even, even more today, like consumers today. You know, if you look at. If you look at generational differences, younger, younger generations, they're interested in brands that are responsibly, you know, corporate responsibility. Right. We talk about all of that good stuff. They expect their brands to have a purpose. It's not good enough to just make a product. You have to have a purposeful sort of message behind why you're doing what you're doing well.

And like you said, so many. To add on to that, so many products, the way customers engage with them, and especially when you talk with some of these younger audiences is these products, these brands are becoming symbols of them, they're extensions of them. Right. So if I'm going to be purchasing this product, this has now become a symbol or extension of me. Therefore, I must align with it. And whether they. And most. Most people are not going to consciously go through that process, but they definitely do it unconsciously. If something does not feel right, if I don't feel myself within these touch points, whatever that touch point is, then I'm going to disconnect. Even if everything you're saying, quote, unquote, solves my problem, I'm going to go find the thing that does connect with me on a deeper level, on that unconscious level, because that feels right. And remember, this is something we always talk about. Right. Humans are feeling. Animals that think.

Yeah.

Not thinking, animals that feel. That's correct. So we must start with the feeling first. And the feeling starts with understanding this core concept, beginning with. Because we're going to go deeper into this, of why you exist. Because that is what drives me. Everything, right? Yeah. And so, so even digging deeper into that, because I want to get back to my other question that you said, which was. Okay, so we started off with. Oh, Brad, idea is basic, right. You just have to understand who you are and why you exist.

Right.

Oh, cool. I just have to understand who I am. No big deal.

Sure.

Because all of us understand who we are, Right. I mean, that's just. That's easy. You get that. You know, you get that done when you're a teenager, Right? Wrong. So. So what are some of those, I guess when we say who we are and we're talking from a brand perspective, what are some of the things that brands need to understand when trying to.

Answer that question, when they're trying to answer that question, the first thing you need to know is, you know, sales is a result. It's not the purpose, right? Like just start there, right? It's not. The reason you exist is not to make a million bucks. It's not to make 20 million bucks. You know, that's, that's a result of. And so like just cut it off at the pass and, and, and acknowledge the fact that yes, we, we're all capitalists, right? We all want to make a ton of money. We all want to, you know, retire and maybe not retire, but we all want to make a bunch of money.

Yeah. But.

So just put that aside. That's the result of. So when you're, when you're digging deeper, trying to figure out who you are, try to understand what motivates you, right? And like I elude or said a little bit earlier about try to understand who you are as a person first and why you exist as, you know, as a person first. You know, we've all, we've all heard that term, the purpose driven life, right. If you are someone that puts their focus or their goal on something other than a purpose, right. You will inevitably be a miserable person, right? Because things like happiness and sadness and all that stuff, they come and go. But if you're to use that North.

Star.

Example again, if you know where that star is, right, when something comes along and knocks you off course, you know how to course, correct. And it knocks you off course and you know how to come back to it. Because if you're living with purpose, you're going to be able to aim at that North Star and work to do anything and everything you can to get there, right? And that's not a bunch of hui. That's not a, that's not a fluffy thing. That's a real thing. You know, there's a, you know, it drives me crazy when people always talk about like, you know, oh, I just want to be happy. It's like, well, that, that's a result of, right? That's a result of living with purpose. And then when you take that, that same notion and apply it to your brand, right? So it's not about making the most, squeezing the most money, you know, happiness out of this particular thing or what have you. It's about staying the course of your purpose. So when, when the bad sales come, you know, you can course correct. And when the good sale and you can course correct because you don't want to live too high and you don't want to live too low, you need to make sure that you're. You're staying true to who you are and why you exist. I know I'm getting off topic here, but it is important to note that, that when you're, when you're truly. When you're truly living your brand with a purpose and you. And again, getting back to brand identity.

Right.

When you're sticking to your brand identity, nothing can knock you off of that. It doesn't. It doesn't allow for you to sort of be a leaf in the wind.

Yep. That's.

That's a good way of failing is being a leaf in the wind.

Yep.

And chasing sales, I should say.

Yeah. I mean, we'll look at, for example, I think it was a couple years ago, CVS made the decision that they were. They were all about health care. They were there to take care of people's health, Right?

Yeah.

Well, then they noticed that they were selling cigarettes and tobacco to people and they said, well, that's not helping people's health. We're going to stop selling those and everybody in them, you name it, everybody said, it's going to destroy your sales. Don't do it. This is an awful decision. They said, no, but this is who we are. So we are going to stop selling this because this does not help people take care of and make. Have better health. Right. Their sales doubled and tripled.

That's brand identity. That's knowing who you are.

Yeah, right, Exactly.

That's nothing. But knowing who you are.

Exactly.

And then acting accordingly.

Exactly. So getting back to the question, so again, understanding who we are. And so you start off with. Okay, you need to start off with understanding what motivates you. Okay. What else? Like, what are. What are the elements that. To answering that question? I guess.

Well, you know, it's different for everyone and every brand, and it's really hard. I'm not trying to punt on that question, but it's one of those deals where I've been doing this long enough that if I were to try to answer that with any sort of absolute, the next thing that I do would immediately, you know, disprove my answer. And so, you know, the real answer is.

I.

We wouldn't know how to go about laying that path for a particular client until we got in and did some discovery work, did some research, did some auditing, did some inventory, did those necessary steps to get to the real human truth behind the brand so that we can uncover. I mean, we did this the other day. I don't say the other day, but we did this recently. Where, you know, we went. We were going through this long exercise with a client, and at the end of it, I asked the question, does anyone know why? Or, you know, why you exist now? And, you know, someone had written something down and they said it, and everyone was like, oh, that's it, you know, and it came. It came a bit more organically than would have for maybe a different client. And so it was just. It was the process by which we got people together. They had permission to be honest about things. You know, there was arguing and handshaking and hugging and all of that good stuff. But what comes of that, that particular. Or what came of that particular episode was that they landed on a purpose that they had been dancing around. Right. Because the other thing, too, Justin, you have to understand is, is once you nail down that purpose and you know why you exist, you have to live up to it. And that's a scary proposition. It's the CVS thing that you just talked about, right. If you don't know who you are, you don't have to live up to that standard. Right. But the second that you do, you have to decide, okay, I have to live up to that standard. I have to be who I've said I'm going to be. And that's hard for a brand when faced with a tough decision like getting rid of cigarettes and everyone telling you that you're going to fail because of it. Right. It takes a brave brand that has a handle on their identity to, to make those decisions. But more practically, when we're talking about how do we get to that point, I guess the short answer is you hire us. But the, the longer answer is, you know, there's a series of different, different steps that we, that we take to sort of do some, some archaeology of your brand and of. Of your. Your messaging to help a brand get to something closer that resembles a purpose.

Well, and digging deeper, maybe we can possibly provide a few tangible things for the listeners so they kind of understand what we are talking about as much as possible. Right. Because, I mean, everybody can now understand the concept of a purpose, yet can you hear as much harder? Right. But when we talk about who we are and, and even talking about some things that I'm sure some listeners are used to, when we talk about things like that, sure. It's, you know, what I'm sure listeners are used to is, well, we know what our core values are, and we know what our vision is, and we know what our mission statement is. And, you know, we've. We've. We've got some, you know, standards of conduct that, that we live by. Like, are these the things you're talking about or are these small pieces that go into this discussion?

Yeah, well, I mean, I don't, and.

I don't mean to make them small. I don't mean to diminish them.

No, no. I think it's an interesting question because you're right. Those things are easy to create. That came out wrong. Those things are easier to create.

Right.

But I don't know how you. If you don't truly know who you or why you exist. Right, right.

For sure.

And as an extension, who you are, then I don't know how you could create core values.

Right, right.

Because, for instance, as a. On a personal note, I understand why I exist. I've established this, you know, and I've talked about it with you and the team, and from that I've been able to say, okay, in order to live that purpose, here are my core values. Right?

Right.

And here's my mission statement, and here's my vision for the future. And here, you know, but without that true north purpose, it's very hard to. It's very hard to create those other elements with any sort of. Sort of concrete.

Right.

Like, and that's what I want to talk about. A leaf blowing in the wind. Right. If you're changing your core values every year because something changes, then it's very hard to. It's very hard to believe that you actually, you understand who you are and why you exists. But, you know, more practically, I guess, is the question, Justin, what are the. What are the actual things that we would do as an agency to help someone figure that out? Or is the question, like, rephrase the question because I want to make sure that I'm answering it correctly.

Absolutely. So when we're talking about this concept of who we are. Right. This massive question.

Yeah.

Is there, is. Are there practical or tangible, Whether that's phrases that the listener could say, okay, great, if I can make this statement, then this is how we know we have answered that question. Right. Or are there certain elements that. Here's how you hear the things to know, to be able to get there. Because. Because I think what you just said is great. Right. Because I would think that most people would say great. Well, if I'm going to tell you who we are, I'm going to tell you what our core values are, and I'm going to tell you what our vision is, and I'm going to tell you what our mission statement is. But you're like, but yeah, no, no, those things are results of understanding. So those actually aren't how you answer that question. Those are things that are results of being able to answer that question.

Yeah.

So then, so that's kind of what I'm getting to. So. Okay, great. If we're going to say this is how, you know, you're able to answer that question, is there a, you know, like a Mad Libs phrase or something? Right. That the listeners could say, okay, great, this, this is, we're on the right path.

Yeah. There's a couple of ways to do it. And at the risk of ripping off, you know, Simon Sinek, what he talks about is if you were to, if you were to go to, if you were doing it individually, if you were to go to your best friend, if I, if I were to say, you know, go to your best friend and tell me why they're best friends with you, right? Nine times out of ten their answer is going to, is going to be a purposeful or a purpose like statement, right? I'm best friends with Paul because he is dependable and he's selfless and he is always willing to lend a hand, right? Okay, so then I can take that and I can sort of mold it into a nice statement that essentially is, I exist for this or to this. Right? I exist to do this so that others can do this. Right? That's sort of how Simon Sinek couches it. And I buy into that. I think that works. You know, also, if you can't go any further, right? If you, if you're, if you've racked your brain and you physically can't think of any other underlying reason.

Over the.

Course of days or weeks, right? If you've gotten to a place where you're like, I just, there's just no other, there's nothing behind that statement. You're getting either there or damn close. And you know, you know, those are, those are kind of the, those are kind of the, the litmus test ways to see if you've, if you're getting close or if you're there. And then, you know, just like anything else, you know, validate it with, with, with your audience, right? So if you're married, go ask your wife. If you're, you know, if you're a kid and you live with your parents, go ask your parents. If you're a business, ask your customers, right? Like, why do you align with us? Why do you think? Like, ask. Or you know what? If you're an agency, ask your best customer, ask your Best client, right? Say, reach out to your number one client and say, why have you been with us for so long? And why do you pay us so much money to do work for you? Right? And they're going to tell you back, back to you what you believe is your purpose. And they might say something else that's interesting that will actually either validate or it will, you know, fly in the face of what you thought about yourself. But again, it's all about holding a mirror up to who you are, up to what you believe about yourself. And, and in the context of a brand identity, again, I know we keep going around on this, but it's super important. Like, how is anyone going to believe anything you say if you don't know who you are and why you're saying it? And so when we're talking about a brand identity, you know, the two most important things that you can provide a customer are the why you exist, right? Your, your purpose so that people understand if they, if they align with that. And then your product positioning, which is a, an extension of that, is going to be sort of your, your outward thing that you're providing, right. If you're, if you're, if you're the brand and you're essentially looking at yourself as a mentor, right, you're not the hero in your story, you're the mentor. It's a Cinderella thing. And if you're providing that magical gift, right, that magical gift has to pay off your purpose, your foundational brand identity. And so those are two strategic pillars. On one side of the organizing idea that exists in this goofy little matrix that, that we, that we work from. You know, those are strategic pillars that you have to understand about yourself so that you can be true to your brand identity over and over and over again. I think, I hope that that answered your question.

Well, sure. And again, it's, it's. When you're getting back around to. Is simply this. If I'm going to summarize.

Sure.

What, What?

Yeah, I told you brevity was not my strong point.

Well, you're a creative director. You're here to, you're here to romance and tell beautiful stories. I'm here to simplify things. But it, what it comes down to, from what I'm hearing, is who you are. It is. There's no way to one simplify that answer. It is. The answer to that is understanding your purpose. And in turn, understanding, as you said, it's a Simon cynic, right? It's understanding why you exist, how you do what you do, and what do you do? Right. It's that golden circle. If we're going to give the client or listeners a way to try to answer that, how to get to it is if you can answer those three questions, you can go through the Simon Sinek golden circle. That's how you've been able to answer the question.

Yeah, I, I, I, I would agree with that. It's just, it's a tough road to do by yourself. And that's, that's what I, what, what I want to make sure is crystal clear that at least shines through, is that, you know, the hardest thing.

What.

Do they always say? You know, it's, it's the cobbler. It's the cobbler whose kids don't have, you know, shoes. And it's the, you know, the, the plumber with leaky pipes.

Right.

You know, I started a small business, you know, years ago that was a massive failure because I didn't know how to market it. Right. And, and, you know, you look at someone like me and you'll go, well, that doesn't make any sense. Well, it's because I wasn't able to get out of my own way and validate the things that I thought I knew about myself and what I was trying to do. I needed outside help. And so when you're going through this process, it takes a really good, for lack of, better say, that moderator to help guide you. Because like I said, I've worked with clients and I've worked with agencies that needed this help, right? Where we've gone through this process and they thought they had things nailed until we opened up eyes a little bit and made them go, well, let's dig a little deeper. Let's dig a little deeper. Let's figure this out. Let's pull that thread. And so, yeah, it is. I mean, if you understand, if you go from the inside out, you go, this is why I exist. This is how I'm different. And this is just the manifestation. This is what I'm creating. You're light years ahead of most businesses. And, you know, I mean, to be honest with you, it would be an ideal world if every one of our clients came to us and said, hey, I already have this laid out. You know, I, I would love it. I don't need to be a part of that every single time. In fact, you know, it, it's not that I don't love doing that work, but it would save me a lot of, you know, spittle flying in my face, you know, to have, to have that stuff already. Already, you know, mapped out from the clients that, that, that I work with or that we work with. I should say so. Yeah. I mean, more power to you if you can do that. But it's a tough road.

But it's like you said, and we talked about this in the last episode and I'm going to keep at every time we are going to have any type of communication and creative discussion, I'm going to say the same thing. So hopefully our listeners are, will get sick of it because that means that they got it right. At least they, you know, they know what I'm about to say, whether they agree with it or not. But we work in the human connection business. We are connecting people, we are dealing with human experiences. Okay. So the way that you approach your brand is going to be no different than the way you would approach yourself. It is the same thing. We need to understand all these elements about ourselves. Like you said, this process starts with you. That's the first place to start, is with yourself. And, and so in order for you to continue to have these long lasting relationships with people, you need to understand these elements so that you can build a strong foundation of trust and honesty in your communication with these people.

Yeah.

The only difference is this is coming from a brand on a mass reach scale and it's not one on one. But the concepts are the same. You're not going to continue to communicate with someone that you don't trust. And you don't necessarily know every time you don't trust someone. Right. It's not always as blatant as an action that they took that shows that, you know, you lack integrity. Sometimes it's just a feeling and you're like, I don't actually know why, but I gotta, I'm getting bad vibes off of that person over there. So. No, no, they didn't say anything. Nope, I didn't, I didn't see them, you know, hit a baby seal as you said earlier. I didn't see anything that's so blatant that, you know, is, is, is so easy to discern. I just got a bad feeling. Yeah, that happens time and time and time again. When you're talking about the interaction of brands with potential customers. Yeah. And it's because they haven't done this work. Because once you've done this work then, and we'll go to the. There are the other elements. Right. Understanding your audience. But at that time you will start attracting your audience. Why? Because you know exactly who you are. So the way you communicate is going to resonate immediately with the individuals that you want to resonate with.

You know, Justin, that. That just made me think of something, right? Let's say you're at a party and you walk into. Or let's say you're at a party and someone walks into the room and they exude confidence and individuality, and you just. Everyone sort of, whether they realize it or not, sort of does one of these, right? And. And that person's charisma and confidence and whatever it is, you know, it causes all the eyeballs to. To at least give a glance, right? Because it's like, oh, someone. Someone just walked in the room, right? That's. That's because that person knows who they are and they're confident in who they are. And you're right. If a brand has that, you're going to be attracted to it, right? You're going to.

You're.

I mean, as long as. Like I said, as long as it aligns with your, you know, your. Your values, like, you as a consumer, as a customer, are going to say there's a. There's a. There's a confidence, for lack of a better way to say it in that brand, that they know who they are and they're unapologetic about who they are. And, you know, that is. That's an attractive quality, right?

And I think that's perfect. And that's one thing that we've constantly talked about here in the podcast, as far as what our jobs are. You know, we. We've talked about it before that our jobs are a dating service, right? This is the same thing here. We're here to show, great, let us help you understand who you are. So therefore, you can attract the mates that you want to attract. You can get the dates that you want to get. And you're not the person in the bar who spent all this money on the latest clothes. You got the latest car, and you're walking in there and you're like, this is a piece of cake. Yet you were doing all of those things out of pure insecurity. But you think they're the right things to do because you read it in this magazine or, you know, you saw that podcast or whatever it is, they said this is how you get the date, right? So do these things and you walk in there and everybody, like, just runs away from you. You know, like, you stink. For some reason, you're repelling them instead of attracting them because you haven't actually figured out, this is who I really am. So this is who I'm going to be. And then I can attract the individuals that I want to attract that align with myself. Yeah, well, that's what I see time and time again. Brands do, right? They turn into that for like that guy, right?

Yeah. If you're disheveled, like, nobody wants to be around you, you know, it's. It's just the truth, right? You know, I mean.

It'S. But, but even then, I'll take a step further, right? If quote, unquote, disheveled and that's who you are. That's who you are.

That's true. I guess if, I guess if that's your brand, you know, like, and it's funny, I have a good friend of mine's like, you know, I joke about having a beard and tattoos and he's like, well, that's part of your brand, right? And it is. You know, they're. I know who I am and I know. I know the. And again, knowing your audience, that's a total. That's another podcast, right?

That's another podcast.

But, you know, I know who I am. And you know, brands that know who they are and remain true to that identity and, you know, are going to attract, Are going to attract the people that they're going, that they're trying to attract, you know, and, and, and to get back, though, to get off the dating thing real quick, but to get back to the organizing idea, part of it, like, the organizing idea in the context of this discussion pays off the brand identity, right? So it comes from a place of this is who we are. This is the idea that we're putting forward forth into the world because it's paying off the values and the positioning that, that, that we know to be true from who we are. Right? And then the other side of that, like we've just talked about, was if you know your audience and you know what makes them tick and you know what is going to resonate with them, you have to marry those two things so that your organizing idea will pay off who you are, but it'll also attract the audience that you want. And so that's why that first strategic pillar is understanding who you are. And I cannot stress this enough that, that saying that, again, what we make is this is not who you are. Right? So, you know, again, when we're talking about the organizing idea, that the, the place to start is knowing thyself, right? Know thyself. And, you know, then we'll have a place, then we'll be able to move forward with strategy and creative and all the good stuff that everyone Wants to jump right to, right, let's make a thing. Well, right, we can make a thing, but let's figure out, you know, some of these foundational things first.

Right, exactly. So again, I mean, I think that's a great place to stop. I think this is a great discussion again to kind of recap your brand identity when we're talking about it, especially when you're trying to get to this concept of organizing ideas, understanding who you are, why you exist. And for all of you who are trying to go through this process, it starts with yourself. Start with yourself. Ask yourself these hard questions. Ask yourself to try to understand your purpose. Then you can dig deeper in understanding as it relates back to your brand. And if you're a brand manager and you're not, you know, you're not the inventor of things and you're listening to the show, well then, now you can start asking these hard questions right now you can start as we were talking about here, start doing some auditing of what's going on. Do you have brand guidelines? Right? What do you see? People act like in, in the office and for the brand. And that's all top down, right? What is, what is the experience that maybe some of the customers of the product and the brand are saying about their experience with it? And see where is there misalignment, right? Do you, do you, or is there already a true continuity? Then you say, okay, great, I think we're there, right? Start, start going through and doing some of your own kind of auditing to, to do some of this, this deeping, the bigger deeping, excuse me, and, and be able to go through that golden circle, right? Why do you exist? How do you do it? What do you make?

Yeah, Justin, one, one more thing real quick before we leave, before we cut out here. You said something there that I think it bears repeating that this, while it might seem like this should be a top down sort of implementation, this is why we exist and everyone else has to fall in line. Truly inspired companies will take everyone's opinion into consideration. And that's why part of what we do is when we do these stakeholder workshops, we invite a cross section of people from the business, from the CEO down to the person that sweeps the floors and everyone in between. Because it's important to, whether you do anything with it or not, it's important to understand how everyone's feeling right now about the company so that they, you know, we can, we can all sort of get back into that alignment and, and head in the right direction. So you mentioned that you, you talked about it, but it definitely, it definitely bears being highlighted. The last thing too is none of this is a trade secret. Right. Like, I just want to be very clear, like, you know, we didn't invent any of this stuff. It's just we believe in it so much that we got good at doing it. And we've seen the results. You know, they're just, it's just black and white. We've just had success doing this. And that's why, you know, we push so hard to get our clients to, to, to take the time, you know, obviously to, to put in the effort to, to do some of this work so that we can be more effective and more efficient.

Absolutely. And, and, and, and I. That's again, the way that just the human mind works is our rational mind tries to come up with reasons for what we're feeling and we've come up with different names for these feelings to again, to try to rationalize these things. So this is also why it is so very difficult to do this on your own, because you're trying to describe a feeling that your mind doesn't truly understand. And it can only understand it from the perspective and your experiences that you had in the world. But your mind is built to create continuity. It wants it to make sense. Your mind doesn't like the unknown because that goes back to the unconscious mind, which is meant to keep you alive. The unknown is something that could kill you. So it's going to make up this story that creates that continuity and alignment to rationalize what's going on. That may not be really true. It's just what you know. So it's having. And it doesn't matter if it's us or anyone else, but it's having those broad perspectives and it's having that mediators being able to pull those things out of you because you are, in your own way, in many ways, if you're not, if you don't have these tools and even those of us who do have these tools, it takes us years and years to get there, especially on a personal level. So it's not going to be any different for your brand. So that's the value. And that's also us to say, hey, if you don't understand this, we're giving you permission and letting you understand why you may not have it yet, and that's okay. And this is why people like us exist, is to help help you along that journey to be that stage. And it's not your fault that you can't do it. On your own, because very few can.

Well, it sounds like you just, you just like named your purpose. That's, that's why people like us exist.

Huh?

But, you know, you're not wrong, Justin. I mean, you know, it's the other, the other half of it. And I know we were trying to wrap up, but that's okay. I could talk about this stuff forever. But the other, the other part of it too is it takes someone else to sort of shut down your bias, right? Because again, everyone thinks that their product is the best. Everyone thinks that it's going to solve world hunger. Everyone, you know, but in the real world, nobody cares about you or your product. They care about how it makes them feel. And that goes back to knowing who you are and why you exist. And that's how you're going to make someone feel some way and that's what they're going to align with.

Right?

Your product just happens to be the manifestation of that feeling. So, you know, and then again, like I said, it's knowing your audience and knowing how to, how to connect with them, which, you know, we'll get to that on the next one, it sounds like.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely. So again, I'm going to, I. We're wrapping up.

We are going to wrap up.

We are wrapping up this time over. So again, thank you for listening to the CPG Insiders, the podcast. We really appreciate all the love and support that we're getting from you. Can't thank you enough. Please let us know if you have any questions on this topic. Please. You can reach out to myself, you can reach out to Paul, you can go to our website, www.jnh labs.com or cpg insiders.com Reach out to us. Let us know if you have questions. Let us know if there's a topic that you want us to, to dig into even deeper. We would love to do it. And of course, you know, please refer us if there are anyone else in your lives that you think that would really enjoy, enjoy the show. And if you, if you love it as much as we are, again, believe so. And the listenership keeps growing. Please leave us a five star review so we can keep growing and keep reaching more people. Because as Paul just, you know, just stated, our purpose here is to help, is to help entrepreneurs. We exist to elevate your experience and help you grow and reach new heights. So we want to reach as many people as we can. So thank you again for your time and I can't wait to see you next time on CPG Insiders. If you're looking to greatly increase sales.

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