Be Specific When You Articulate Your Brand Identity

Specificity is really, really important when it comes to the attention of your target audience. Let me give you an example. Have you ever been at a conference, and you meet someone. Hi, I’m Kerri Konik from Inspire Fire. What do you do? And if the person goes, um, we … And there’s a hesitation, a delay, and then are story is going to come out. I can tell you, and you experience probably the pain associated with this is that, they’ve already disconnected with you. You’ve already been dismissed, quietly. What’s going on there is, they don’t really mean to be rude, or to dismiss you. It’s just that your non-verbal signals are speaking louder than your brand voice. What’s happening is you’re stalling, you’re hesitating. And that sends a signal of non-clarity, that you’re unclear. What you do, for whom, why, and what is the emotional solution you really provide?

#Specificity is important when it comes to the attention of your target #audience Click To Tweet
So if you stall, maybe you have something in your mouth or you’re swallowing and you’re at a cocktail party and you’re eating hors d’oeuvres, that’s okay. But say that, say oh sorry, give me a moment. Gulp gulp. Then come back and say, we are a boutique brand identity firm…well don’t say that, I’ll say that. We’re a boutique brand identity design firm, and we help small businesses, entrepreneurs, startups, and nonprofits with a movement.

Be Clear & Succinct With Your Elevator Pitch

Pretty clear, pretty direct, pretty succinct. That’s going to be a different conversation, but succinct and specificity is crucial, or else they will absolutely disengage. There’s a great book out called The Attention Economy, and it talks about the pull on all of our attention, and you really, really have about two seconds to connect. You’ve made a connection, you think you have a captive audience, and then you kind of … drop the ball. They’ve already moved on. They’re probably very nice, but they’ve actually been distracted by something else. What happens to you as a brand, if you’re the owner of that brand, is it affects your self esteem. It affects your courage and your confidence. You’re like what’s wrong? How come everybody is making assumptions about what I do? Or that I don’t do what they need. They didn’t even listen. They didn’t listen because you didn’t speak up, with clarity, with specificity, at the first get-go, unless you’re very very specific, they will disengage.

Be direct & succinct when giving your #elevatorpitch. #smbbranding Click To Tweet
So look at your quick elevator speech, your introduction speech. Can you very succinctly, very clearly, and very specifically, explain what you do, for whom you serve, why, and would you like to know more? Okay? If you can’t do that yet, I’d like you to go back to the drawing board and work on that so that you’re very, very specific. Then you can elaborate, embellish, and engage deeper without losing them in the first pass. Okay?

Kerri Konik is a seasoned brand strategist and leading expert in igniting emotional connection and optimizing customer experience to drive business growth. She is a consultant, advisor and speaker on catalyzing the emotional bonds between customers, brands, and leaders to increase value, progress, and accelerate the speed of change, growth and desired impact. An entrepreneur at heart, Kerri has launched five businesses, and is the CEO of InspireFire, a women-owned brand strategy and marketing consultancy based in Philadelphia.