If you don’t have a team of marketing experts at your disposal, how can a small business keep its brand relevant?
That question — and many others — were answered by a panel discussing “Building a Brand from the Ground Up and Evolving Your Brand with the Changing Times” at Peachtree Corners Business Association’s Business After Hours Speaker Series event on May 15 at Hilton Atlanta Northeast.
Moderator Amanda Pearch, business owner and content strategist, led participants through a series of thought-proving scenarios to flex creativity muscles.
The panel included Andrew Hajduk, president and owner of marketing production company Vox-pop-uli; Darrell Creedon, CEO and president of Diversified Resource Group, a commercial furniture retailer; Bill Frey, president of Illuminating Design; Clara Rooks, senior marketing communications manager for Explore Gwinnett; Lisa Slopey, a communications and investor relations manager representing Ride Lounge; and Suzanna Martinez, president and founder of PEO for the CEO, a professional employer organization that helps businesses streamline HR operations and cost savings in health insurance and workers compensation.
Key points included the importance of brand integrity, company culture and consistent messaging. Hajduk emphasized the need for multiple touchpoints to build brand recognition. Martinez highlighted the significance of personal branding and timing. And Frey discussed the role of innovation in branding. All in all, the panel agreed on the importance of visibility, community involvement and adapting to market changes to maintain brand relevance.
Integrity and identity
Pearch began the discussion with questions about the importance of brand integrity and core identity — through market shifts, generational changes or crises — in standing the test of time.
“I think that the nonnegotiable that a brand has to have is integrity to its purpose,” said Hajduk. “What do you stand for? How do you deliver? Are you a low-cost provider? Are you a high-end company? What are you trying to do? That is your core essence. It’s got to be all the way through your people, and it’s got to stand through that.”
Pearch then changed the tone with a focus on culture and Explore Gwinnett.
“When you think of tourism, you probably don’t think of Gwinnett County. You think of Disney World or the beach or some super, super cool destination,” said Rooks. “But Gwinnett has a lot of visitors. It has a lot of business travel. But we don’t speak just to those [people]. We speak to the locals, everybody that lives here in Gwinnett County. So we really try to have consistent messaging so people know they can come to Explore Gwinnett.”
With 17 cities throughout the county — each with unique characteristics and points of view, Rooks said Explore Gwinnett’s job is to represent each one effectively.
“They can rely on us for plugs on our website, our e-newsletter, social media to be the one-stop shop for everything — their unique restaurants and attractions and things to do,” she added.
Representing the newest venue on the block, Slopey explained what’s new and different about Ride Lounge.
“One of the things I love about Ride Lounge is that it brings together car enthusiasts — people who have cars, love to talk about their cars — and so they want to come together and celebrate it,” she said. “If we operate with integrity, people are trusting us to store their most prized possessions and to take care of them.”
She added that although a lot of other auto storage facilities lock vehicles away, Ride Lounge gives owners the opportunity to showcase their cars, providing events where people can come and talk about them, show them off to other people and share that love of cars.
Branding, storytelling and personal connection
Frey talked about the importance of storytelling and how a company is perceived by the outside world.
“How do other people perceive your company? How is it seen from the outside world? We can tell you what we are, but it’s how we act and how we behave and the consistency in our messaging that really creates our brand and tells our story,” he said. “How do you want to be perceived when you’re not in the room to talk about your company? I think that’s fundamental in developing your brand.”
Martinez shared her experience of developing her personal brand and the importance of making decisions on controversial topics.
“As I was transitioning from a W2 employee for a large PEO company, I always knew that I was eventually going to go off on my own, so I had started my own personal brand and social media,” she said. “Trying to do social media ads and branding, there are certain things that could be nonnegotiable, that I don’t want to talk to, and I don’t want to go there. So … some of my social media people wanted to post a blog on something [controversial], and I was like, ‘No, that’s not where I’m going to go.’”
Creedon shared a story about the importance of personal branding and how clients buy from people, not just logos. When he set out to start his own business, he gauged if his top clients would follow him if he couldn’t provide the exact same products as the current company.
“The key takeaway from that was [the client] said, ‘Darrell, I’ve never met your boss. I don’t even know what product I’m buying. I buy from you.’ And that really sunk in with me,” he recalled. “It was a big relief, because if she didn’t go with me, I was in trouble. She was the nicest one. I might have to rethink this.”
Brand vs. branding
Pearch asked the panelists to define their brand’s promise and how they deliver on it consistently.
Hajduk explained that Vox-pop-uli helps people simplify vendor management by being a one-stop shop.
“We understand what [clients] are trying to communicate, and we take care of that by delivering on time so they don’t have to chase all of those things,” he said. “That’s why we have some really long relationships.”
Slopey described the unique experience provided by Ride Lounge.
“At our business, people who are enthusiastic about cars have the opportunity to really showcase that,” she said. “We allow car enthusiasts to showcase their cars and share their passion.”
Frey discussed the importance of innovation and speaking to the why — not just the what — in branding.
“We talk to clients about the why, the experience, what they’re gaining from dealing with us, and not the what, not the products, not the hard, actual physical products, but speak on the emotion — what’s going to drive them, what are their motivators?” he said. “And with innovation, we found the ability within the company to kind of find new marketplaces and new areas to work within.”
Martinez shared her approach to branding, focusing on servicing clients and being a single-source solution for payroll, HR and employee benefits.
“Helping my clients with a single-source solution when it comes to payroll, HR, employee benefits … saves them time, and it helps them make sure that they’re compliant,” she said. “It helps them as they’re onboarding and off-boarding employees, and it just helps companies grow and scale.”
Creedon emphasized the importance of being true to clients and finding new marketplaces to evolve the business.
“We don’t want to be below the radar, even though I still kind of like to be that way,” he said. “I realized our competition is doing things that we have to adapt to or we will not thrive. It’s important to listen to what your team says and be willing to take a chance and trust them and hope that they know what they’re doing. So far, we’ve had nothing but success with that.”
Challenges, recommendations for business leaders
“What are some recommendations or challenges that you’d share with other business leaders as they’re building their brand?” Pearch asked the panelists in conclusion.
Hajduk emphasized the importance of getting out there and being visible in the community.
“The number one problem is obscurity,” he said. “They can’t buy from you if they don’t know who you are. Our tagline is now tastefully obnoxious because we have to be out there.”
Martinez pointed out the importance of educating the network and being in front of clients at the right time.
“With a lot of companies that I talk to, everything is about timing, and typically the timing is when they get ready to renew on their benefits,” she said. “I’ll talk to so many companies, and they’ll say, ‘I wish I would have known your service existed, because I just did this whole process internally.’”
Rooks considered the evolution of Explore Gwinnett’s brand and the importance of maintaining brand equity.
“We used to be ‘Travel and Tourism’ and then ‘Tourism and Film,’ and now we’re just ‘Explore Gwinnett,’” she said.
She explained that her organization is funded through hospitality tax and during COVID there was very little travel.
“Filming got really big in Gwinnett towards the end of COVID. So we changed our brand to include film because we wanted to be a film destination.”
Frey shared his experience of evolving his business during the housing market collapse and the importance of being true to your values.
“In 2008 we were really just starting, and the housing market collapsed. We were only a residential holiday lighting company at that point in time. So in time, we figured that we needed to do something a little bit different,” he said.
Frey found ways to evolve the business into one that created large displays for entrances to neighborhoods.
“Property values were diminishing, so people needed something to show why [someone] should be looking to buy in their community,” he said. “We started as just a holiday lighting company, and we’ve expanded into doing projection mapping in museums. It’s working on very large-scale projects across the southeast United States.”
Creedon added the importance of trusting employees who may have insight into areas you don’t. He had a group of furniture designers that suggested he consider expanding to hospitality furnishings when COVID sent office workers telecommuting and companies weren’t buying desks and cubicles.
“It’s a whole segment of business that I had never had any interest in and probably shied away from because I thought it’s a few bar stools and I didn’t want to deal with that,” he said. “They convinced me to take a shot.”
Now there’s a collection under the DRG brand that has a different vibe from what the company traditionally produces. “You have to have the guts to take a chance,” he added. “And you have to listen to your team and give them some flexibility and leeway to give it a shot because, as all the great athletes say, if you don’t take the shots, it never goes in.”
