If you’re an author, illustrator, entrepreneur or anyone else passionate about their work and interested in having a wildly successful personal or corporate brand, this is for you. An epic transition has been taking place that has revolutionized the way brands are built. The old way doesn’t work for the vast majority of cases. But the new way, the modern way of building an incredible brand is alive and well. Let the dead bury the dead and come along to ensure you’re building your brand in a way that works now and for the years to come.

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I’ve been listening to business leader and prolific author Seth Godin quite a bit recently and one of his major speaking points is captured in the story of seeing a Purple Cow. The jist is, if anyone drove by a farm and saw a truly purple cow, it would be considered remarkable. It would be something that demands a remark be made. With no additional effort from the cow, apart from surviving as a purple cow, the news would travel far and wide. Everyone would want to tell someone about it. If it’s worth making a remark about, in Seth’s words, “It is remarkable.”

Along this same trajectory comes another of Seth Godin’s analogies…the sneezer. The story behind the sneezer is if someone has a cold, a virus, and sneezes, they share that virus with other people. Those people in turn sneeze and the virus finds itself being the talk of the town.

Building a great brand in today’s economy is all about the essence of what the purple cow and sneezer represent. The purple cow causes people to share the information with other people. The sneezer is the one sharing the information.

Brand Building in the Past

Back in the day, companies spent money on advertisements and various forms of marketing to reach the consumer. This happened through television, radio, newspapers, books, magazines, and other forms of digestible media.

This effort to impact the largest number of people possible required substantial monetary investments and only worked if the returns on those investments were greater than the cost.

Brand Building Today

We live in an age like never before. A creator and a consumer are able to find each other and connect all over the place. Creators and consumers can connect on deeper levels than ever before and the barrier to entry (business term for the cost it takes to do this) is near zero.

To build your personal or professional brand in today’s economy, you simply need to create something of value, connect creator to consumer, and foster that trust relationship.

Creating Something of Value

Do you know which restaurant near you serves the best burger? What about the grocery store that always has what you’re looking for? Ever meet a hair stylist that goes above and beyond?

Creating something of value must be the foundation of the modern brand. It can be a great book. A beautiful painting. Excellent customer service. Whatever. But, as Seth Godin puts it, it must be remarkable and worthy of remark. I’ll give you an example.

My wife took our two boys in for their haircuts to kick off the school season as many parents would. Yet, my wife didn’t text me saying to check it off the box. Instead, she sent me before and after pictures. The haircuts truly were perfect. The boys looked so handsome. I couldn’t help but remark how great they were. My wife then proceeded to tell me who the stylist was that did the hair cutting. Her name is Sam. We’ve had her before and she consistently does a great job.

My wife told me how patient she was, how good with the kids she was, how pleasant and kind, and even how considerate she was when one of the boys has to use the restroom, causing her to wait and not do anything more to the older boy’s hair until mom got back (which ties up the chair and reduces the rate at which she can process customers). My wife gave her a tip. And do you know what she did next?

She asked me if she tipped enough or if she should have tipped more. My wife and I went around and around about how can we pay this hair stylist MORE for the wonderful job she did. We even made a plan that the next time we get her, we’ll tip her even MORE! When my wife’s friend asks her who she uses to get the boys’ hair cut, what do you think will happen?

My wife is going to sneeze. She is going to share that wonderful Sam virus all over the place. Sam doesn’t need to spend money on marketing herself, in the old sense of the word, because she has built her marketing into her brand. She creates a valuable service by giving excellent customer service and fantastic haircuts. She is exactly what we mean by a purple cow. She (her service) is remarkable. We cannot help but make a remark about it.

What are you creating of value? What are you giving other people that your marketing is built into? When people interact with you, your book, your art, your business, your consulting, whatever it is, are they going to take it with them everywhere they go? Will they be proud to sneeze it all over the place or will they act like it never happened and let you fade away into obscurity?

Connect Creator to Consumer

We have the ability like never before to connect with one another. Twitter is a prime example of this zero cost barrier to entry. Within minutes, you can establish yourself on social media, easily connect with people who are interested in what you do or the service you provide, and build trust between you and them to form a bonded community.

All too often I see people not engaging with other people. They are your consumer! They are the ones who will choose to sneeze or not when you provide your product or service. If you don’t connect with them and build layers of trust, they will not advocate for you. There are million dollar mistakes happening all the time when people ignore other people.

Find, connect, and grow with people. Find your tribe or whatever you want to call it. Find people who love what you love and then deliver something of remarkable value.

Fostering Trust

We make trust much more complicated than it needs to be. Trust is simply following through with others. If you tell me you’d like to grab lunch but never call to schedule lunch, how’s our trust relationship going to be impacted?

If you tell me you’ll show up at 5:00pm sharp and you show up at 5:00pm sharp, what direction is our trust relationship trending?

If you created an author or illustrator brand for yourself, but you haven’t written or drawn anything in a while, can’t you see the impact that has on our trust? Trustworthy people consistently deliver what they say they will.

But that leaves us with a question.

What are you saying you will deliver? See, a big problem today is many people have no clue what they are selling. An author says they’re selling a book, but the book isn’t written yet. So, what are they selling?

They must sell themselves. And to do that takes humble, courageous authenticity. They must give before they can get. They must share who they are, what they are working on, what they believe in, and what you can expect from them. All of these things build the layers of trust between creator and consumer so that, when a product or service is available, and it delivers on the promises already shared, the consumer can’t wait to sneeze all over the place.

You see, if a science fiction author is working on a book, they can share some ideas. They can share some feelings. They can share the process, the challenges and the victories. They can relate to others and discuss common interests. They can get to know other people and trade ideas. Then, a year or many years later, there will be a tight knit group of people passionately interested in the author as a human being. They know them for who they really are and they are their biggest supporters. Not because the book’s cover is top notch or they wore the book so fast it broke a record. But because of the trust that was fostered between creator and consumer.

So, I ask you. Are you creating something other people will find valuable? Have you already created it? Whether product or service. Are you connecting with other people and finding those who truly love what you also love? How are you building trust with them? And is your marketing built into your valuable creation so much so that it’s worthy of making remark?

If you found this blog post helpful or encouraging, it would mean the world to me if you shared it on social media using the buttons below. Truly remarkable products or services are not in competition with each other. Remarkable things have no competition. They are unique and valuable. If you’re working hard to give remarkable value, let us know in the comments below what you do or what you’re involved with. As always, if you’d like to know when future posts like thing one go live, please subscribe to my blog.

Now, go be remarkable.

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