Ryan Deiss On Keeping Your Brand Human (As You Scale) Part 2.

You're listening to Business lunch with Roland Fraser. This is your seat at the table. Hello and welcome to the show. This is Darren, the producer. Now, last week we shared part one of this amazing teaching from Ryan Deiss. He's an entrepreneur, author, investor. He's one of Roland Fraser's partners. And today we get to hear part two of the character Diamond.

So.

So today he moves onto the east west parts of the character of the diamond concept that he talked about last week. It's an idea that has emerged out of the acting storytelling space and Ryan has transformed it for business and branding purposes. So if you want to help strengthen your brand identity and business ethos, you will find this super interesting and especially helpful if you're looking to move your personal brand into more of a business brand. So listen, before we start, if you want to go a bit deeper with Roland and you're interested in his five day epic challenge has blown up in the last year, go to businesslunchpodcast.com EPIC which stands for ethical profits in times of crisis. So there's another challenge starting April 15th. So if you want to learn to grow and scale your business, check it out. All the information's there. Businesslunchpodcast.com business epic. All right, let's get on with the show.

So, yeah, you gotta get all the pieces. And this is the thing that a lot of folks do, they create characters that don't have a personal life. Here's the key. Conflict. So if you have a really, really smart person who's also just like a really nice guy, Yay. You know, like, that's not fun. That's not interesting. If you have someone who is. Who's an absolute genius savant, who is a total and just really horrible at people. Now you got Sherlock Holmes, who. And then later on you get the character House, right? Which is Sherlock Holmes in a hospital, right? And they didn't even try, like Holmes House, Wilson Watson solving puzzles. It's the same freaking story, right? You get the same character. Tr. Charlie Sheen fundamentally has always played the same character. His character in Wall street and his character in Platoon. Same character. Just one of them is in the jungles of Vietnam and the other is in the jungles of Manhattan, right? So we begin to see these things. So I want you to think I'm stalling here because this is the one. This counter star is the one where a lot of people do get it wrong. There's gotta be conflict. So what is your mutant power? What mutant power? Because remember, our job in business is not to produce happy customers. It's to produce true, changed, and successful customers. Right? So they're the ones with the superhero cape on after we leave them. So what is their mutant power that you leave them with? What's the problem? They have? And now that's gone. So give me the transformation. You can't fake it. So there's a difference between fiction and fakery. Yeah. This is a caricature, right? So, you know, like, you ever see, like, my favorite is Jay Leno, right? You ever see a caricature of Jay Leno and he's got like a chin that's basically coming off his chin isn't that big, Right? You're amplifying. So is that fake? No, but it is fiction. Okay. And what I would simply say is we're complex people, and as long as it's not contrary to what you and your brand is today, then it's probably fine. This is a good strategy, by the way, if you're going into a competitive market, create a counter brand. So essentially, build a brand for. Build a character diamond for your biggest competitor. So think about Starbucks, okay? So with Starbucks, you have this idea of kind of this Seattle hipster, I'm better than you. But it's also really, really cozy and welcoming, right? So I'm super uppity. I'm gonna say. I'm gonna use. I'm not gonna say medium. I'm gonna say grande and venti and all these things, right? But I'm gonna have a really comfy, cozy couch that you can sit on, right? So, okay, so you're kind of a. But you're a welcoming. So I'll deal with that. You see what I'm saying? Now, if I'm creating a counter brand for that, what I want to do is have something super duper friendly, but get the hell out, you know, fast and friendly. Hey, good to see you. Yeah. And it's not. And the music isn't like soothing and like coffee. It's like upbeat, like, boom, boom, boom. You want to create a counter brand that's totally opposite, but you don't know what's opposite until you first outline what this is. So we got a general idea of our primary. We've got a secondary external. Now we're going to come over to the non negotiable, the hill that you're prepared to die on. All right, what is your non negotiable? If you stand for nothing, nobody will trust you. In our lives, there are people that we very much disagree with. You probably have very close Friends, family members that you couldn't be on more different, on opposite ends of the spectrum politically or maybe even like religiously. You totally disagree, but you respect the fact that you know where they stand. And maybe you have a. We're just going to have to agree to disagree on that one, all right? We're just not going to talk about it. But you respect the fact that you know where they stand. Now compare that to someone who you know in your life, who you look at, I don't like them. They're wishy washy. There's sometimes where they agree with you, sometimes they disagree. You don't really know. So you're like, I don't like them. All right? And that's just. This is just basic behavioral psychology. If I don't understand it, I probably should kill it because it may want to eat me type stuff. So we want to understand and we trust people. So having a non negotiable, having a hill that you're prepared to die on is what builds trust. Alright, so we're creating some interest here. This is somebody that I want to know, all right? I want to know them because based on what I'm seeing, that seems like a pretty cool person. That's an interesting character. I want to get to know them. Non negotiable. What's the hill that they're prepared to die on? They got to have some. So what is that for your brand? The old fashioned. The old ways are better, right? And so that may be the hill that you're prepared to die on, right? The old ways are better. Using chemicals to produce the things that you sleep on, maybe it's safe, I don't know. We know that this is the way it's been done forever and it worked. So why change right now? You plant that flag, you make that known. For Superman it was truth, justice in the American way. For Spider man it was always protection of the innocents. That's why he's trying to save busloads of kids at any given time. And it's like his girlfriend over here and a busload of kids over here. It's like I don't know. I'm not pick for Sherlock Holmes. It was the puzzle must be solved no matter what. I don't care really who gets hurt because again I'm kind of a right. What is it for your brand? What's the hill that you're prepared to die on? What is your non negotiable? We absolutely positively will not change this for digital marketer. It must be step by Step. And it must be proven. No theory. We're not going to say we think that this will work. Okay? What you might have as your non negotiable is spare no expense, right? If you think about four seasons, four seasons in general is the service must be amazing. Highest quality, spare no expense. But again, these are things that are a little more internal. You may not put this at the top of your website, right? Your website may be speaking more benefit rich, but when you get into the mission and what you're all about, this has got to ring true, okay? It has to ring true. On the other side, we've got the one that nobody ever wants to do. Or if they do, they do it. Like when you get asked in the job interview, what's your greatest weakness? Kind of thing. And you're like, I just worked too hard. And that's what they want to put up here. The quirk, the mask, the flaw. You're not so secret sin. This is the thing. So if this is what creates interest, right? The north and south is what creates interest. It's what gets people's attention. It's what makes you worthy of more than just a glance. The non negotiable is what builds trust. Interest. Trust. Humanity liking. We like people, we like brands when we know that they screw up just like us. If you have someone that is too perfect, you might admire them, but you generally just want to watch them fail. If you don't believe me, think about why. The vast majority of the people who watched the Olympics last winter watched figure skating. And I can assure you it was not to see perfectly executed triple axels. It was to watch these perfect little figure skaters fall on their asses. Okay? People go to NASCAR to watch the wrecks. Human beings, we rubberneck when there's an accident over here. We are sick, twisted individuals who are all desperately broken. And we just want to know if we're not the only ones. All right? And when we know the only thing that we relish more than tearing someone down is picking them back up after they've fallen. What's the first you get Way louder cheers. If you bust your ass as a figure skater when you're done than if you just put together a gold medal performance, right? We love. Oh, my God, you got back up. We love that. We freaking love that. So what's your quirk? Your mask, Your flaw? Superman had no kryptonite. He truly was this amazing Superman who is all about truth, justice, and the American way. And he's just always gonna win. And he's always on your side and he's always freaking great. And he can't ever lose. They added in kryptonite. That helped. When you get into the 80s after they're sitting here watching, why are we getting our butts kicked by Marvel? Finally, DC said, let's make Superman really bad with women and socially awkward. And so much of that showed up when the screenwriters got involved and they turned Superman into a movie with Christopher Reeves. This is a boring person that nobody's gonna cheer for. What if he's terrible with women? Let's bring that back around. What about Batman? Batman, you've got this, like, seemingly really, really rich guy who has it all that at night is a secret vigilante, right? Rich people don't have to do that. Rich people just doing their thing. But now you're a vigilante, right? Ooh. And I want to make sure that the bad guys lose because the bad guys hurt my bad guys killed my parents and this and that. So I'm going to make sure that the bad guy always loses, that good's going to win. Then they just made Batman just kind of freaking crazy, right? If you look at the Dark Knight series, Batman just got freaking nuts. Like where you begin to question his motives and it's because his suit went from blue to black, right? So there's all these little signals where it's like, ah, now this is getting a little bit interesting, right? I'm beginning to. I'm beginning to actually question the motives of this individual. This is what makes characters human. All right? This is the thing that makes characters human.

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Ryan Deiss here. Now, if you've ever run paid ads, you know it is not easy. You've got to create the ads, track the ads, optimize campaigns, and scale the winners while killing off the losers. Look, it is a lot of work, which is why time and time again we turn to an agency called Grow Rev that to help us with our paid media campaigns. They run paid traffic for some of the biggest names in the industry, from Tony Robbins to Dean Graziosi, ClickFunnels, and many, many others. And Rohan Seth, the owner of Growrev. Well, he's a great friend of ours here at Business Lunch. And because of that, he's offering Business Lunch listeners a huge freebie. Rohan's team is giving out 25 free account audits. No charge, no fee, and no obligation to buy anything. What they're going to do is they're going to go into your account, they're going to audit everything, and they're going to show you what you can tweak to lower your acquisition costs, increase your conversion rates, and boost your average order values. Now, this is a $500 value, and the first 25 Business Lunch listeners get it totally for free. So here's what you need to do. Go to getmyfreeaudit.com audit again, that is getmyfreeaudit.com Audit and grab your free audit today. What is your actual flaw? What is your actual flaw? Now, this is internal again. This is not gonna be at the top of your webpage, but much like peeling an onion or as your audience gets to know you, it should begin to come out. All right. Why does this matter? It's how you scale your marketing without going corporate. Y. I gotta believe that the I'm a Mac, I'm a PC. I gotta believe that was some of the easiest ad copy to write. I'm not taking anything away from the people who did it. It was genius. But that was just sitting there. It had been there for those jokes had all been made before, right? So it's how you scale your marketing without going super corporate Y. It's how you make your brand more interesting and likable. It's why people like Chick Fil a more than kfc. You know what you'll never see in a Chick Fil a ad? A chicken. You'll see cows dressed up like chickens, right? And the cows are saying, so who's the person? The cow is the person. Don't eat cows. We do all the things that you do. We skydive. We stand on two legs. Don't eat cows. Eat chickens. When you realize that KFC is not in the chicken business, they're in the guilt reduction business. Especially when you understand who their primary audience is, right? KFC is selling guilt reduction. Don't eat that unhealthy beef that requires you to kill one of these adorable cows. That's just like you doing all these human stuff. Eat a nameless, faceless bird. How do we become more likable? It allows your Brand to one day stand alone without a specific face or personality. Digital Marketer has only gotten larger as a company as I've continued to pull back. From time to time I come around like, hey, everybody. But I still joke about it. Every year I walk out on stage at TNC and so many people have no idea who I am. They have no freaking clue. They have no clue who I am. We can can turn over other faces at the company, which happened happened in a big way. You're talking about some of the most visible people at our company. I miss them. They're great. I'm not saying I'm glad they're gone, but we were able to move other people into those roles. That's not being mean. That's called running a business. I was able to step away from Digital Marketer for nine months last year and no one noticed. None of our members noticed. None of them seem to care. Yay. All right, you want to be missed, that's fine. You're just not going to build a brand that somebody else is going to want to own. All right, so let's build a character Diamond. Here's kind of the first step. Identify persons or persons in your company that most exemplify the brand. It doesn't have to be the founder or CEO, but it does need to be someone within the organization that they speak on behalf of the company. Okay, so just because you own it doesn't mean it has to be you who are the people that are going to be really guiding the personality of the brand because they are the ones that are there. That's the first step. More times than not, though, it's the founder. This, incidentally, is another reason why founder led companies tend to outperform companies that aren't founder led. And it's also the reason why when founders are taken from companies and the corporate types are moved in that they fail. They fail. And it happens if they don't go through this process. Step two, have this person make a list. Or if it's you favorite books, movies, TV shows, comic books, bible stories. Make a list of all your favorite things. What did you read? What did you love as a kid or now? What are the characters that you really admire? That's step two. Step three, note the characters. So we don't like books because of the story. We like books because of the characters. Now, something interesting and compelling had to have happened to those characters, but. But something really, really bad could happen. And if you don't like the character, you don't care. Dexter, if he's just a serial killer, then it's not the same story. It's maybe a detective story. And now we care about the detective, and we want the detective to find the bad serial killer. In this case, we want Dexter to get away with it because we like Dexter. If we don't like the character, if the character does not resonate with us, if we don't identify with the character, the situation that they're in, that is, the story is irrelevant to us, okay? It's totally irrelevant. You ever had somebody tell you a really freaking long story about someone you don't know or care about that they know? Like, oh, let me tell you about Jan from the office, and this and this and this happened. Oh, my God, it was so bad. And you're trying to feign interest. You're like, I don't freaking care because I don't know this person, all right? I don't care. Like, that sounds bad. That sucks. Sounds like it sucks for them, but I just don't care that much. It's not interesting. All right? You like these different books, movies, TV shows because of the characters, not merely because of the stories. And if you consider the fact that all these stories are always the same, that's proof there's some that you like and there's some that you don't. It had everything to do with the characters and almost nothing to do with the story itself. Step 4. Group the characters based on character traits, based on general themes. All right, so do you like people that are. Who are the underdog and win in spite of all odds? That's a particular type of character. The Everyman. Think about Rudy, right? It's kind of the everyday person. Do you like the person who wins through sheer intellect? So, you know, they don't win because of hard work. They win through the power of their intellect. And things come very, very easy. But it's almost like, magical how they do it. Do you like somebody who wins because of some extraordinary superpower? This is where we get into mutants and magicians and wizards. We like them because we admire them. They can do things that we can, and we think that's kind of cool. So what were the ones that you tended to like? What are the ones that you tended to like? I know the ones that I always resonated most with were the characters that kind of were the underdog. Maybe it had something to do with being just a touch shorter than everybody else, you know, But I really. I didn't resonate with the strongman all that much. You know, I thought that Superman was kind of a. Just kind of a douche. I don't know. I didn't like Superman all that much. I thought Batman was a little bit interesting, but it's like, yeah, I mean, I get it. You're rich. Like, your mutant power is money. Like, that's cool for a little bit. I loved Spider, and I didn't really care that much for X Men. Like, I thought there were some interesting stories. I really liked Spider Man. I like. I like this kid that now all of a sudden could go and do this scrawny little weakling that now I can go do it. That resonated with me also. Some of your favorite athletes. I was a Craig Biggio fan. If you know anything about baseball, Craig Biggio was this. He wasn't a big guy, but he's out there getting hits and doing his thing way more than I liked the slugger. So you start to notice these traits in you. You notice them in you because we're holding up all these other ones as a mirror, and we like what we see in them, so we want to see more. Now you plot the most important and congruent traits on the character diamond. So we're beginning to extract those general themes. Now we can start to plot them. So the primary character trait is they must be extraordinary at something. Is it extraordinary intellect, extraordinary strength, extraordinary powers, extraordinary insight, knowledge, Right? So maybe what they. Maybe they're more the treasure hunter, and they stumbled across something that's known in marketing as a Blackie story. All right, so you've got a normal person who met this old man that everybody called Blackie, and Blackie revealed the secrets of life to this ordinary person. And then Blackie's like, well, you know, have a great day. I hope that benefits you. And Blackie, you know, starts to walk across the street and bam. Gets hit by a bus, and he's freaking dead. Right now, the only other person who knows this amazing insight is this dude that just happened to sit on a park bench next to Blackie that day. So it's not his extraordinary intellect in and of himself, but again, we begin to see these characters emerging again and again and again. Somebody stumbling across something, the underdog, right? Something extraordinary. We've got our counter star. We know the hill that they're prepared to die on. So this is a process that you can deploy in any of your companies. It is something that we keep internal. We teach it to all new hires. It's an aspect of new hire onboarding. We don't necessarily hire based on these character traits. But if somebody is unwilling to show their faults, they're probably not gonna fit in. And we're certainly never gonna put them on a stage or in front of camera.

You've been listening to Business Lunch with Roland Frasier. If you're enjoying the show, let us know by subscribing and leaving a review. And for more information, go to businesslunchpodcast.com thank you for listening.

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