Seven principles for building a great brand

By Tina Zwolinski
CEO of ZWO

 

My company ZWO has been heavily involved in helping apparel companies make the right branding decisions for many years. It’s been full circle for me, back to the jobs I had in high school and college where I worked at G. Fox, Lord & Taylor, and Sage-Allen. I loved retail and especially have loved the apparel industry for its unique and direct appeal to individual style. Rarely does an individual get to present a unique personal style for a product that is also so functional.

As I’ve immersed myself in the apparel industry, I’ve noticed that some brands are built “right from the beginning” because their founders have started with seven core principles that apply across all industries, all brands.

1) Steve Jobs said “You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out.” A good brand in the apparel industry is birthed out of a passion rather than simply a desire to make “another shirt.” From an activity or lifestyle comes the desire to create clothing that fits that lifestyle. That passion will carry a founder in any industry through the trials of creating — and more importantly, holding true to the brand vision.

2) The brand must stand for something. Because only if the brand stands for something does a consumer want what that brand represents.

In the apparel industry, a brand represents a lifestyle and helps make that lifestyle more enjoyable. If you hunt, the apparel brand helps you hunt, both practically and stylistically. If you don’t hunt, the brand helps you learn more about hunting and enter into the lifestyle more easily.

No matter the industry, a brand’s strong identity — taking a position or pursuing a singular goal — is what its markets find so appealing.

3) If the brand stands for something — appeals to a unique set of people who appreciate what the brand represents — then the brand will not be attractive to everybody. This is okay.

It’s more than okay. It is one sign that the brand’s leaders are making the right decisions about the brand.

One of my favorite movies is Good Will Hunting. The primary theme comes straight from the character played by Robin Williams: “Real loss is only possible when you love something more than you love yourself.” Getting used to the idea that certain people will not like your brand or choose it, and that some will even dislike the brand, is one of the hardest things about leading a brand. You love the brand — you’ve poured everything into it, including great passion and risk — why shouldn’t everybody love the brand?

But people have different values, different priorities, different ways of living life. They’re unique — just as your brand should be unique.

Ultimately, if you do not focus on the brand’s integrity and credibility all the people who were true to your brand, who bought in to the values and lifestyle of that brand, will leave you, and the hangers-on who never identified with your brand will move on to the next big thing anyway.

You must be true to the path, even as others off the path may criticize, heckle, and undercut. As long as you are criticized for the direction of the brand, rather than for a lack of quality or integrity or service, you are most likely on the right path.

4) Along with the temptation to attempt to appeal to everybody, brand creators will often choose partners and investors who don’t understand the brand’s identity and don’t appreciate its intrinsic values.

Don’t do that. Even when it allows you to make a quicker dollar, investors and partners are drivers, and they will affect the integrity of your brand. Your mother was right — whom you choose to hang out with tells the world who you are.

5) Author Mark Danielewski says “passion has little to do with euphoria and everything to do with patience. It is not about feeling good. It is about endurance. Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It means to suffer.”

So often we think of passion as like “fabulous yellow roman candles. . . exploding across the stars.” And there are times when a brand leader experiences that kind of passion. But ultimately passion also allows us to have the confidence and endurance to be patient.

6) It is only after you have all the above — passion, clarity, direction, commitment, and patience — that you can turn your mind to marketing and publicity for your brand. Even when your brand develops a strong  identity, people who might value the identity your brand represents simply must hear about it before they can buy it. As you’ve worked to achieve excellence with your product or service, now work to achieve excellence with your website SEO, your PR plan, your marketing — all of which will serve the ultimate purpose of introducing people to your brand, allowing them to appreciate it, and encouraging them to tell others about it. Your brand must be “talkable” — you must have communicated its values so clearly that people can talk about it easily to others. Those who love your brand are your best marketing agents by far. They’ll drag all their friends to see what they love so much.

7) Because your brand has unique values, there will be natural causes that reflect your brand. Connect with those causes that are relevant to your brand.

Blake Mycoskie, founder of shoe company TOM’S and author of one of my favorite business books, Start Something That Matters, points out that giving is not only good because it helps people, but because it helps business. Customers who are proud of and want to feel connected with a cause become partners with you. It’s easier to recruit great employees who seek significant work.

Not only is it a way of doing good — the committed focus of a company’s time, energy, and money behind a cause is powerful — but it helps your brand establish strategic relationships with those who care about the same things you care about. It further communicates your brand’s values and identity. And of course, a cause connection is a pipeline to new customers who may not have heard of you.

The good news is that no matter the size — large like Patagonia or smaller like Billabong — any brand in any industry can “begin right” using these seven core principles.

 

Tina Zwolinski is the CEO and founder of ZWO, a branding & marketing firm that engages brands and consumers in remarkable ways. For the past 20 years, ZWO has advised and consulted with clients in diverse industries, gaining particular expertise in apparel, student housing, retail, sports, and youth markets. For further conversation, you may contact her at [email protected]