Charlie Birch on LinkedIn: If I told you my team and I could help you... 1. better understand your… (2024)

Success is when the plumber comes and says "You need a new toilet." and you say, "All right let's do it!" without a second thought.Success is when you decide you'd rather overcharge (knowing you can always add more value later) and lose the job than undercharge and resent the job.Success is when your husband runs over the septic tank caps with the lawn mower and the plumber quotes you $800 in labor and supplies to repair. And you say, "Do what you gotta do."Success is when someone tries to haggle with you over your prices and you say, "Scope is negotiable to a point. Price is not."Success is when the plumber says "You need a new faucet." and you know that means you actually need two in order for your jack and jill sinks to continue to match and you say "OK."Maybe the numbers in my bank accounts, the area code I live in, the number and value of my client accounts wouldn't have you feeling all "Yippe!" But the fact that I can, for the most part ...- turn down bad fit clients- be myself with my clients - go for a swim in my pool in the middle of the day any day with my husband - eat dinner with my family every night. - see my mom whenever I want- walk barefoot in the woods- walk barefoot in the sand- get to yoga- fall asleep next to my babies without having to set an alarm pretty much every night- and pay for whatever the plumber says I need when I need it without having to scramble. Well that to me is worth celebrating!Everyone's metric of success is different and its fluid. Sometimes we move the finish line and never give ourselves the chance to celebrate. This is not an original idea. I know that. But maybe you need the reminder. So friends, what is your metric of success!? Is it imposed? Outdated? Or in need of celebration? Have at it! Stay human! #success #metricofsuccess #celebration

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Small biz owners, do you have a customer appreciation system?Ex: we do brand identity development and management. And at the end of a given client engagement, we surprise our clients with a piece of branded merchandise (their brand not ours). This:1. Makes clients feel appreciated.2. Adds value to our services3. Allows clients to rep their brand (we designed) w/ pride. 4. Creates a conversation piece for clients to talk about their business AND ours5. Keeps us top of mind!#customerexperience #cx #customerretention #customerappreciation #culture #brandvalues P.S. notice what happens if you start saying "Thank you for trusting us." Or "Thank you for your business." Instead of "Thank you for your support."

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Common practice is not always aligned with best practice. And while it would be easy to blame this truth on stupidity, sometimes it's quite the opposite.I have this great sales coach Martin Stellar who helped me get past a lot of my own hang ups around pricing and selling my services and in the time since we worked together, I have raised my prices, consistently sold higher end packages, retained more ideal clients, and had the honor of scaling from solo to team (see @HumanizCollective).As this transformation was taking place, I began to notice that 90% of our clients across both website and branding projects were established businesses. We rarely work with new businesses.This may seem odd, because when it comes to building a brand, experts agree that there is an ideal sequence of events starting with foundational brand work moving into design of core assets and then graduating to brand management or brand stewardship as we call it at Humaniz.However, professional branding services range from $5k-$20k+. So it’s understandable that the common practice for many small businesses, is to skip the foundational work entirely, dip their toe in asset design by creating a logo and maybe a business card or website and just start throwing ideas at the marketplace to see what sticks.Like many of my colleagues, I am guilty of judging this decision based on my own irritation at being "skipped over." Puffing up to mask the fear that my services may not be valued or as valuable as I wish them to be.But the truth is that it would be borderline irresponsible of me to sell my services to a business that is pre-revenue unless they had significant backing.And Martin taught me that sales should never do harm.The general opinion is to reinvest 8-10% of gross annual revenue into brand dev and promotion. Knowing this I understand that our ideal client is a well established business bringing in somewhere between $500k-$700 an year.Some might look at this reality and say, “But Charlie, established businesses don’t need branding.” Wrong! but that is a conversation for another day.Here, I want to reinforce the idea core idea I am sharing in these graphics are is a deeply held belief I stand by."Skipping over the brand development process is a bad life plan for your business."And while most bad life choices can be corrected, changing course is hard and sometimes impossible.So while I am boldly stating “DON'T invest money in a brand until you have a business.” I am also shouting from the rooftops, "DO engage in a brand development process before you invest in a single brand asset or marketing campaign."Confused? Yes! I am saying, "DO IT YOURSELF!"And when the DIYed work pays off, you have established yourself, and you have money to reinvest, give me a call and I would be honored to guide you through the often stressful but also highly rewarding process of refreshing or redesigning YOUR brand!

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The last couple days have reminded me about the sneaky power of association. We have a new client, thanks to Meg Pritchard. His initials are PAC. Understand, my background is heavily steeped in performing arts and in that world PAC stands for Performing Arts Center."See you later at the 'PAC.'" And despite knowing better, I keep catching myself thinking, "Why is Meg emailing me things about a PAC?"I bring this up because, associations - especially unconscious and semiconscious ones - are often the silent persuaders of consumer behavior. This my friends is why branding is so important!Moreover, it's why knowing your audience - the human beings who you hope to connect with and serve - is vital to the brand development process. Even if you plan to proceed under the false impression that brand is merely a logo, associations your customers may have with said logo matter! On the most basic level, the quality of your logo can cause people to make a snap judgement; "professional" or "amateur."But don't just take my word for it, type "statistics about judging businesses based on visual branding" into Google to see a results page littered with supporting statistics. And it's no mystery or secret why! Some visuals look professional and some look amateur. The latter gives the impression that you don't invest in yourself, which leads potential customers to think, "Why should I take you seriously if you don't take yourself seriously?"Thus one could argue that the amount of money (and/or time depending on your skills) you spend on your brand visuals directly impacts the amount you can then charge for your services.Of course, we recommend taking things a step further and developing a comprehensive brand identity system - complete with motivations, values, vibes, core messaging, ideal client avatar, brand style guide, voice guidelines, and brand design rules - but that is a conversation for another day. Food for thought!

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In an earlier post, I hung my sign as a "control freak for hire" and promised, "I'll make sure your marketing team, ops team and yes you too don't muck up your brand in the name of trends, efficiency or whatever other sneaky forces are flying around your business masquerading as good ideas."And it's true, but also true is the fact that trends are not all bad and can be leveraged to your advantage or the advantage of your brand. We are primed to see patterns, to process the familiar and filter out the unfamiliar. This is why it is easier for us to see the subtlety and nuance in and be compassionate toward people who are somewhat like us, while it's harder for us to extend that same courtesy to those we experience as "other."It's also a bit counterintuitive and why so many of us are toiling away trying to "differentiate ourselves from our competitors" to no avail. In fact, positioning your business to be just a little different that what people expect is often the better approach than being a total wild card that people have no idea what to do with. This of course bangs the drum, "You have to know your audience to understand what is familiar and unfamiliar to them."But I want to stay on point with this idea of trends and how to use them in relationship to your brand. Just like a person, a brand can lean into a trend in a way that compromises their identity or compliments it, but your identity can not be "trends." A business that replies on trends to make decisions, will feel trite, redundant, empty and superficial. There words will be nonsensical and their actions will have a destructive impact on the business's ability to grow and thrive overtime.To the contrary a business with a well developed brand identity can look at a trend critically and strategically and determine if and how a said trend aligns and can be leveraged to its advantage. This is exactly what we empower our clients to do, and sometimes do for them. Together we create the foundational identity they need to navigate the ever changing marketplace with integrity so their business can grow up healthy and strong and attract the right people into its orbit.

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Goodnight desk, goodnight therapy lamp, goodnight chair, good night iPad, goodnight keyboard, goodnight spreadsheets, goodnight workaholics everywhere. https://lnkd.in/ey6x-RK6

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Details matter. Semantics matter. People matter. Relationships matter.Simply put that's what Humaniz Collective is all about. Branding in all it's forms and stages are just the words we use to play nice with capitalism. What deeper truths lay behind your titles and jargon?

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Control freak for hire! Yes, if you hire me I'll be your control freak. I'll make sure your marketing team, ops team and yes you too don't muck up your brand in the name of trends, efficiency or whatever other sneaky forces are flying around your business masquerading as good ideas.

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LAME Customer Experience Alert!HelloSign only provides live chat to potential customers - when it helps them get your money.They don't provide live chat support to paying customers - once they have your money you have to wait for snail email support responses. L - LazyA - AnnoyingM - Mediocre (at best)E - ExperienceI honestly think that business should have to provide live support to anyone who takes their money. That should be a law. It's absurd that people can take your money and then not provide a pathway to a live customer service person. DO you agree?https://lnkd.in/eTAdb_f6

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