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00:26

Well, hello, welcome back to A Brand Less Ordinary podcast where we talk about how to make your brand less ordinary and stand out by doing things that make your brand feel like you. Today, we're talking rules. If you have followed me for any amount of time, you will know that I do not like rules when it comes to business.

00:55

when it comes to branding. So I'm going to read you a little list. Pick two colours, stick to them forever, use the same font on everything. Don't mix too many styles, don't use stock images. You've got to look professional, whatever that means. Don't be too niche or you'll put people off, but you also have to have a niche so that you can find the right people. But also try to appeal to a wider audience. Don't be on too many social media platforms, but make sure you're not only sticking to one social media platform.

01:22

Keep your bio clear and simple. Don't be weird. Don't be too much. Don't be too loud, but don't be too quiet. Make sure everything matches. Be aspirational, but also be relatable. Be personable, but also be credible. Show off your qualifications. Be bold, but don't be off-putting. Be you, but like a kind of tidy version of you that isn't going to make anyone uncomfortable. Got that? So those are the rules that we're being led to believe are...

01:48

what we need to do in order to be successful. And as you'll have noticed, many of those completely contradict each other. So what is it that a business owner is supposed to do to be able to actually run their business in a way that feels good? What you're being given is just a load of rules that somebody once made up and what it's causing you to be and every other business owner is exactly the same as each other, which makes you just a bit bland and you blend in.

02:16

So this is what we're being told as business owners, take all those interesting bits of yourself, smooth it over so that your business comes across as professional. And here's all of the steps that you must follow in order to make your business grow. But what we're wondering then is why nobody stops scrolling, why we're not getting any attention, why we're not getting any engagement. And I always think a lot about this specifically, where those rules came from and who do they actually benefit in the long run?

02:45

Most branding rules weren't handed down from some person that is in charge of the whole of business land somewhere. They weren't like carved into a stone tablet back many, many years ago. They're just things that people came up with and they've been repeated so many times that they've started to sound like facts. And today I want to talk about what actually happens. What would be the worst thing that could happen?

03:12

if you didn't follow all the rules that someone else made up and you actually just make your own set of rules for your brand and your business. Now before I get into this, because I know that somebody is already thinking and someone's probably already typing a message to me, I just want to be really clear about what I'm not saying. I'm not saying that you get to ignore every single rule in business because some of them exist for genuinely good reasons and there's some that you absolutely have to follow. There is no debate about that.

03:41

And I like to think about this in terms of like baking versus cooking. So I love cooking and I feel like I'm good at cooking. I am less good at baking because when you're baking an actual cake with actual chemistry and things that need to go together right, I really struggle to follow recipes to a T. I kind of like to do my own thing as you've probably noticed from business as well. But when it comes to cakes, you've got to follow the recipe exactly because here we're talking about actual science.

04:10

You can't just swap self-raising flour for plain flour and hope for the best. You can't just use less eggs because you didn't have any and then just pray it's going to work exactly the same. You've got to measure things because all the things have to work exactly together or you're going to end up with something kind of sad and flat or just doesn't taste right at all. So those rules aren't things that are up for debate. They're the rules that you have to actually follow. And branding has rules like that too and business.

04:38

For example, if you're sending anything to print, you've got to use the right kind of colors. You've got to have everything made in CMYK and not RGB. That's something that all the designers know. And if you are sending something to an actual printer, they're going to send it back to you if you haven't got the right settings. It's got to be the correct resolution. The bleed has got to be set up properly. You've got to have the right file formats for the right job. And if you get them wrong, it just doesn't work. Colors will be printed wrong. Edges will be cut off.

05:04

and the printer will be calling you and you're having these awkward conversations because you didn't know anything about that. Just like nobody would argue when your cake comes out all flat that you just didn't do it right. No one's going to argue with like a pixelated logo on a huge banner. It's because you just didn't do it right. So those rules exist because of like physics. Then you've got legal rules, copyright, GDPR, trademarking, accessibility. Those again aren't rules that you can just go, oh, I don't like the vibe of that.

05:34

These actually have consequences, so you do have to follow them. It's not just a creative choice, it's ones that are actually gonna stop you getting into trouble. So we all agree to follow those rules too. And then, this should go without saying, basic human decency ones. For example, don't steal someone else's visual identity and call it your own using someone else's ideas, business name, all that kind of stuff. Don't steal someone else's work and claim that you created it like a...

06:02

let's say, and then go and sell it as your own. And just don't be a moron, you know? So whether you're in the online space or in real life, you could just be a normal, decent human being. So we've got rules that cover physics, law, and actually just being a normal human. Those are all non-negotiable, so we're not gonna touch those. But everything else, completely up for debate in business. Just like in cooking, you know, you've got flavors and seasoning, and you'll swap things out in a recipe, taste as you go.

06:31

decide that you actually hate the thing that you were told to put in in the recipe because you just don't like that ingredient or you're allergic to it or something. And then you kind of make it into your own and you can totally do that with cooking. And there's often no real right or wrong answer when it comes to cooking. But as I said, with baking, you need to be scientific. So you do need to follow the actual steps. And that's where I think maybe, you know, business goes a little bit wrong. People think there's all these exact scientific steps that you have to follow.

07:00

And if you follow them to the T, you're gonna get the exact same results as somebody else that followed those exact steps. But it is completely different because what you've got in running your business is you've got all these different personalities and you've got all these different styles of working. Everybody is different in the way that they approach things. So you cannot follow the exact same steps that someone else has and get the exact same results because everything, there are so many different variables.

07:29

when it comes to humans. So let's have a look at three of the kind of main rules that people get told and what you can kind of do instead. First one, big one, consistency, golden rule of branding. The thing that every designer, every marketing course, every well-meaning person in a Facebook group will tell you is a non-negotiable. And it kind of is. And obviously I'm a brand designer. So I'm definitely not here to tell you that consistency doesn't matter at all because it obviously does.

07:57

consistency in your visual style, consistency in your messaging, consistency in showing up and everything like that. But I think we've collectively confused two different things. You've got this consistency in terms of everything that needs to match identically and everything needs to look like an absolute carbon copy of the post before it, or every single time that you put a photo up wearing something pink, it needs to be the exact same shade of pink as the time before.

08:27

Absolutely not, because you've then got the consistency just of a style, a consistency of an overall brand vibe, and you've got a consistency of putting your personality into it. And if people feel like everything is being created by the same person with the same feeling, that's the kind of consistency that you want. The same message delivered over and over again in different ways for variety and the same visual style so that people start to recognise it.

08:56

but it doesn't matter if you accidentally use a different shade of blue on that graphic as you have on that graphic. Nobody is going to notice unless you create everything identical and then that one stands out on its own, you know, as looking ever so slightly different from all the rest because everything looks identical. And that's what you don't want is for everything to look so perfectly generic that it's really obvious when you tweak one teeny tiny little thing.

09:23

you want to be creating that visual consistent style. And what you'll often hear from experts in marketing or branding about consistency, it doesn't cover that personality side of things. And what you've then got is almost like a performance. You're having to put on this show and always be something that maybe isn't quite how you feel that you should be all the time. And there's a difference between a brand that feels itself

09:52

and a brand that is somebody kind of just checking off a list of rules every time they post anything. So whilst you've got to make sure that you're sticking to those really important rules that you must do, you know, the legal ones and things to make sure like your files are set up properly, everything else shouldn't feel like you're ticking off a list. What your brand should actually feel like if it's one that is consistent is if you would imagine, if you were to see loads of brands

10:21

in a line up, you would probably recognize your favorite brands. And it's not just because they followed all the rules. It's because there's a really clear sense of who they are and you'd immediately recognize their style, no matter who else they're amongst. And when you're creating things from that place of you kind of know so much about what your brand is and what it stands for, that it's really easy to be consistent. The consistency kind of takes care of itself.

10:50

You don't have to police it. You don't have to have a checklist. You don't have to constantly ask, does this fit on my Instagram grid? You already know that because you have created this whole kind of brand world that feels really consistent. So the rule about being consistent isn't wrong exactly. It's just kind of incomplete. It's just missing a bit of information and consistency is more like a by-product of when you get really, really clear about your brand, it's not something that you need a list and a checkbox for.

11:20

The second one is around niching. And again, I don't have a problem with niching. I have a problem with how people are led to see niching. People think that you must niche um and work with only a specific kind of person, or you must niche and work with only certain demographics of people. uh everyone is just kind of niching in the wrong way. And again, what happens is when you are really, really clear and specific on what your brand is about, what kind of vibe you bring,

11:49

what kind of people you love to work with, what it is that your work actually does, what is the transformation that people are going to get or what is it that they're buying into, what is it about you that makes your work different to other people's and what happens then is people just naturally self-select and that ends up kind of being your niche. So if you think about my business for example, I don't work only with a specific kind of business owner.

12:16

I don't say, I only work with coaches or I only work with course creators or I only work with product businesses or I only work with female business owners. What I do is work with people who want to put more personality into their brand. So that has become my niche. So I am a brand designer and creative strategy that helps people kind of uncover exactly who they are and get that across in their brand. So that has become my niche without me needing to say,

12:46

I only work with a certain type of business owner, certain age group, gender, anything like that. But what niching can do that's really brilliant for people is if you are somebody that's very, very specific about what you do or who you do it with or for, when you're that specific, almost like uncomfortably specific, the wrong people, again, can easily see that you're not for them and that is what you want to do.

13:11

And whereas people are saying, you can't niche that much because you'll alienate people, or maybe that's what you're telling yourself. You'll find then that you're trying to appeal to the masses and your content is just very general, very generic. And it gets just gets scrolled past because it's not speaking to anyone specific. So there's almost those two sides of the coin that I think are wrong in terms of niching. Firstly, that people shouldn't niche because then they're being too specific.

13:35

and alienating people because no, that's not a rule that we should follow. If you've got a way of being really specific about who you work with, how you work with them, et cetera, then great, be that specific because then you can really create content that speaks to the right people. But then I also believe that people that say you must niche in this certain way, that is also a rule that I don't think should be followed because why does there have to be a certain rule about how you niche? Why do you have to?

14:03

be niching in terms of the exact kind of product or the exact kind of age group this is for or the exact kind of uh business owner, for example. So when you're thinking about your niche, try and think of it from the point of view of what exactly is it that I do? What kind of personality do these people have? What is it exactly that they are struggling with and where do I fit into that? And what makes me different? And then you can be so

14:32

tightened up on your message around that, that that makes people self-select out or in as soon as they find you. We've talked before about being an instant yes. And when they find you, they're like, yes, this is absolutely the kind of thing that I need. And that then your niche kind of naturally comes from doing all of that work. Again, it's not niching that's the problem. It's being bland and blending in that's the problem. And thirdly, the rule.

14:58

about looking or feeling or sounding professional. Who exactly decides what professional looks like? Genuinely, I want to know that because I've looked around at all the people in my kind of business world, the people I follow, the people I look up to, the people that follow me, the people in my community, and I see professional people all over the place, but it certainly doesn't look like this kind of corporate suited, you know, professional stereotype.

15:28

that we've kind of learned to think about in terms of someone that is a business owner. It's not all stock photos of people shaking hands. It's not all this kind of office environment. And what professional has kind of come to mean in most marketing terms, branding conversations is kind of like inoffensive. Nobody could complain about this. Nobody could be offended by what I'm saying. And that ends up being forgettable.

15:58

I understand where it comes from. comes from like fear. It comes from, if you do something that's personality led, something a bit unexpected or anything like that, that people maybe won't take you seriously or they'll think badly of you or they won't like what you're doing. And then it's more personal because you're basing your business around your personality, a potential client, potential collaborator, whoever you want to come across to them as credible. And that's totally valid. But the businesses that look the most credible are the ones that know what they're doing.

16:28

the ones that really do have a sense of who they are. And that doesn't mean that they're the most polished. It just means that they're the most confident in talking about their business, talking about what they do and actually coming across like they actually know who they are. And there's a massive difference between that. It's a difference between like a brand that's made actual choices, have a point of view, looks like it was made by a human being that actually cares about what they're doing. That's way more credible than

16:56

something that looks like it was just put together from a template. Because at least then there's a human behind it actually making decisions and deciding how to show up rather than just being, this is what I was told to do as a business owner. So I'm going to show up in exactly that way, just like everybody else is. So professional definitely isn't like an aesthetic. It's a feeling and you can a hundred percent be professional and have personality as well. You can get there in so many different ways.

17:25

including ways that involve colour, including ways that involve personality, and definitely including ways that actually put you into your brand. You are a professional business owner, even if you don't come across as that stereotypical corporate look. So the way that I've then been thinking about rules is they aren't really rules that mean anything to everybody. They aren't blanket things that we can apply to every business. They're just the defaults.

17:52

And what I mean by that is that a default exists when someone hasn't made a decision yet. It's almost like a placeholder. Like in the absence of someone making a choice, that's what you default to because we don't know everything about ourselves or our business or how we want things to go, which direction we want to take it in right at the beginning. So sometimes you do have to just kind of default to something that feels right or that other people have proven to work.

18:22

But most people are following these defaults when they're way further down the line than just starting out their business, when they should have already made decisions about who they are, what they do, who they serve, how they're different. And they don't ever realize that they made those default choices. They're just kind of running on autopilot, doing what everyone else is doing, but their brand doesn't feel like them and no one seems to get what they do. Everything all looks kind of right, but it feels a bit wrong. So some of the most recognizable brands out there,

18:51

the ones that you would be able to identify from a single post without ever seeing their name. They're almost always breaking quite a lot of rules. And it's not because they're being deliberately, you know, like they're not trouble making, they're not trying to be disruptive as such, but it's because they actually made a decision that the kind of conventional rules or the traditional corporate image wasn't gonna work for them. And that works with some of the hugest brands. They looked at...

19:17

kind of the defaults and were like, nah, no, that's not for me. And then they decided out what was for them and created a brand that actually had personality. And that was their decision. So as you can see, I don't think all rules are bad and you should break them all. That's not the point of what I'm trying to talk about. For example, if you look at consistency, visual consistency, and you do only want to use a couple of colors and you genuinely think, yes, this makes sense for me. I want everything to be so completely.

19:44

bright yellow all the time, every single thing, and that is how I want to show up. Brilliant. Use it. It's yours. Own it. And if you think, oh, I just really want to keep it simple because simple is exactly right for what I'm doing for my audience, for my lifestyle, for my personality. Great. The rules aren't the problem. It's just following them because you think that's what you should do. That's what's the problem. But if you're making a decision that this is a rule that I think this actually works for my business, brilliant. But if you're doing it just because it feels safer,

20:14

Because if you stick to the rules, you then can't really be blamed for anything or you can't be called out for anything or no one can take offense or no one can misunderstand you. That's where the problem comes in. Because following the rules is also a choice, just like choosing to break the rules is a choice. But one of those is obviously the safer choice. And you didn't start your business just to be this kind of safe, bland, boring version of a business owner.

20:42

you started it to create something that you really love, that you really enjoy doing and that your audience will love as well. So I just want to leave you with a question at the end of this episode. What would your brand look like genuinely if you stopped trying to get it right and tick all the boxes and started trying to get it to feel like you? You don't have to answer that immediately. You can think about it. You can sit with it and you don't have to do anything with it today.

21:10

But do have a think about that because genuinely what is the worst thing that could happen if you were to start putting bits of yourself and your personality into your brand instead of just blindly following all the rules because you think that's the right thing to do. So that's it from me for today. If this felt like something that you want to work on, that you want to think more about, I'm always happy to have a chat with people about it. I'd love to know what your thoughts were, what you are scared to change or what you're gonna be brave.

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and make some little tweaks to this week or this month or maybe even just this year. So you know where I am, you know where you can find me and I will see you back here next week for another episode of A Brand Less Ordinary. See you then.