Today, the conversation between Jillian and Veronica revolves around the topics of personal and company branding. They emphasize the significance of personal branding and its role in company branding. They also highlight the challenges of building a brand, the importance of authenticity in branding, and the balance between personal and company branding. The discussion also touches upon the role of marketing strategies and the potential of personal branding to increase a company's visibility.
Welcome listeners to episode 22 of their creative collaboration conversations. In this episode Veronica Guguian and Jillian Vorce discuss personal versus company branding, emphasizing the importance of being true to oneself and reflecting one's personality in both personal and business life. They highlight the need for feedback and listening in order to adapt and create successful brands. The conversation also touches on defining brand, congruence between actions and messaging, and connecting personal branding with company branding.
Veronica Guguian emphasizes the importance of aligning your company's goals with your approach to branding and growth. She believes that personal branding is essential for both small and large companies, as people do business with those they know, like, and trust.
Jillian Vorce agrees and adds that demonstrating your brand values through all facets of your business can help build authenticity. They discuss the balance between personal and company branding, using examples like Andy from Orbit Media who effectively builds his personal brand alongside the company brand.
Veronica mentions that while the focus may shift over time, personal and company branding cannot be separated completely. It is an ongoing process that requires a combination of art and science.
Jillian Vorce discusses the importance of team collaboration and personal branding within businesses. She emphasizes the need to involve employees or team members in promoting the company and suggests that business owners should not let their ego hinder growth. Veronica Guguian agrees, stating that founders must be willing to share the spotlight and embrace different perspectives for sustainable growth.
People & Resources Mentioned in This Episode
About Veronica Guguian
- Website: https://spinideas.nl/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/veronica-guguian
About Jillian Vorce
- Website: https://thejilliangroup.com/better
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jillianvorce
Credits
- Music Composed by BeeLa Music
- Voiceover by Amanda Balagur
Jillian Vorce: Hello, welcome to episode 22 of creative collaboration conversations with Veronica and Jillian. And I am still Jillian and I'm with my good friend Veronica. Hello, Veronica.
Veronica Guguian: Hello, Jillian. And yes, I'm still Veronica as well. Nothing changed?
Jillian Vorce: Not yet.
Veronica Guguian: Not yet. Not planning on it.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah. I hope your year is off to a good start.
Veronica Guguian: Yes, always good energy.
Jillian Vorce: So quick check in any new little updates, ideas, thoughts, discoveries, new tool book and event things.
Veronica Guguian: I must say no thinking the same thing. I think the focus at this point is more on recharging the energy. So, taking it easier just listening to some good music and recharging, then you can't create if you're not full.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah, that's true.
Veronica Guguian: And always at this time of the year, I feel like hibernating. I think this is the Romanian part of me when it's cold outside and all you want to do, the cup of tea under a blanket.
Jillian Vorce: So I feel like that's a good visual to just imagine because I feel like the topic for our episode today, like comparing personal versus company branding, lends itself to being comfortable, finding a comfortable place to sit down, having a cup of tea, or maybe you're on the treadmill or on the tram or whatever you're doing, but to somehow find a comfortable place to just think about this and we'll chat a little bit about our perspectives and experiences with personal versus company branding.
Veronica Guguian: Exactly. The fact that I feel like hibernating in this period, that doesn't mean everyone needs to feel the same. I think it's about just being true to what you feel at that point and following that. And I think that's actually a nice way to go towards the personal branding because personal branding should reflect who you are as a person and as a business person, but also as a personal, like you, individual. And I don't think, especially for the entrepreneurs, and I would advise the professional ones to take it out because your personality is reflected in the way you are working and is reflected in the way you conduct business and you build relationships and you basically show up every single day in your private life as well as in your business life. So it's very hard to separate those two.
Jillian Vorce: Funny, when I was thinking of preparing for this conversation, the first thing that came to mind for me is the episode we did on sales versus marketing. And so I think marketing, yeah, company versus personal branding. I feel like they're both yes and scenarios.
Veronica Guguian: Correct? Exactly. I'm always having this discussion with my clients, especially the one-man show type of clients. So when they are coaches for example or personal trainers, we have some, but they are very small businesses and usually they start alone and with the plan of hiring people. Or maybe they already have some employees or collaborators. However, they are the main image of the company. How do you approach that? And I'm always telling the story of how I started spin ideas, because spin ideas, when I started, I was alone. So it was me deciding, me planning, me executing, me doing every single aspect of the business. And of course it is overwhelming and it's normal to be like that. But how do you build a brand that no one knows about, especially in the first month, in the first year?
Veronica Guguian: You need to tap into your personal branding, especially if you have a big network. But that brings me, maybe it's a chicken and egg. How do you build your personal branding? Do you need to start working on your personal branding before building your company branding or do you do them in parallel? I think we have a lot to discuss today actually on this topic.
Jillian Vorce: So what if we start with identifying or comparing? What do we think of brands? Like defining a brand? So I mean, obviously we can look up Oxford and all know everybody has their own kind of definition on it. But I'm curious, what do you think about the brand? How do you talk about it with clients or how do you describe it?
Veronica Guguian: This is a very good question and there are several ways to approach it, but how we do it is basically step one of the spin methodology that again, we can link the free resources in our script, not script transcript, but it's basically who you are and how do you want to be perceived? What are your values, what do you believe in, what do you want to communicate? And for me, everything goes back to values. And I know I'm boring because I keep on repeating that, but it's something very dear to me. And this is actually how I want to show up and this is how I want to work and this is how I want to conduct business.
Veronica Guguian: So it's basically Brandis, who are you and how do you want to be perceived and how do you want to communicate with your audience and with the people around you? How do you want to have that conversation?
Jillian Vorce: How about that? Yeah, I like that. And the big word is perceived, I think. How do we want to be perceived? Another conversation I often have had with clients is trying to explain that a brand is not really what you say you are, it's what people say you are or how they perceive you, how they experience you. And I also think to kind of build a solid brand, those values should be kind of unilaterally spread across the organization. A brand is not simply lipstick you put on select areas of the business. That's not a brand. It's not going to be a sustainable brand for sure, but it should encapsulate everything, ideally everything that we do, who we are, et cetera. So yeah, the big point I want to make is companies often focus so much on how they see themselves.
Jillian Vorce: We as companies can tend to be a little bit kind of self centered, thinking so much about what we think about ourselves and what we are projecting and what we are telling people. But I think it's prudent to also kind of tamper that a little bit and then step to the side and pay perhaps more attention to what and how we're being perceived by others, in particular, the people that we want to resonate with.
Veronica Guguian: But think about it like that. It's like having a conversation. Because if you as a brand or a person, it doesn't matter if it's about your personal branding or the company branding if you just go and talk and talk. You never listen, and you never get the feedback. Is that actually a conversation? Until you don't see if your message was understood or was received and what was understood from your message. You don't know how to adapt; you don't know what to keep on communicating about. It will be a monologue, not a conversation. Because if you don't get the feedback, you don't know what else you need to create and bring to the market or what else to share. And maybe the best example for us, we started this podcast with specific topics in mind.
Veronica Guguian: We kept on going until we didn't ask and you got the feedback. For example, networking, if I'm not wrong, the networking event I think was one of the most successful we had. And people actually ask for a second one because they want to keep on the conversation and get more information. It's the same thing. How do you know what you need to create or what you need to share more about if you're not listening to the other? And that applies to your personal branding as well as your company branding because maybe in your head you are the best, I don't know, marketing agency or the best service provider or the best business strategist or B Corp consultant. But if you communicate that, but it's not heard like that, what's the point, right?
Jillian Vorce: Yeah. The word that's coming to mind for me is congruence. And so congruence between who we say that we are and how we actually behave right. And also congruence between how we want to resonate and how we are being perceived. So ideally, we are congruent and there's no kind of gaps there. It's kind of like your example about listening to other people and whatnot. So how often do we see organizations that will tell everybody they have really beautiful signs on their walls and all this beautiful web copy about how everybody's voice is welcome, et cetera? But then when the business owner, the leader, whomever, the way that they lead or manage is very dominant and there's no room for anybody else's opinion, that creates a disconnect.
Jillian Vorce: And so we're trying to mitigate those disconnects and instead build businesses that have more congruence between, it's like, do what you say and what you do. It's like making sure those two things are kind of rowing in the same direction. And so that relates to the branding that we do with our logo and our messaging. It relates to, I think, all facets of our business. So how we lead the teams that we build, how we interact with the public, with competitors, with the media, with our community, et cetera. So I think the brand is more.
Veronica Guguian: Yeah, walk the talk. Yeah, sure. And I think that's actually a nice segue. How do you connect your personal branding to your company branding? Because when you start actually, especially with a brand that doesn't exist, you're just launching it. Of course you're going to promote a brand as standalone, but for that brand to get attraction, you do need to share it on your personal account. Right. Or to talk about it through your personal information. What's the word I'm looking for in networks and venues and streamline it?
Jillian Vorce: So I think what's funny is probably you've also been to lots of workshops and webinars and read articles and whatnot about branding. Right. And so often including content that's supposedly for SMEs. Right. The small, medium-sized enterprises. So often the examples used are what Apple and Nike, or Patagonia, and it's like, those are really great and we can learn from. It's not. Do you feel empowered to try to do what Apple did or whatever? It's just not. Yeah, I'm just kind of sharing things.
Veronica Guguian: That's a very good point, actually.
Jillian Vorce: I'm so happy you shared that because.
Veronica Guguian: No one is thinking about it. I think the question is, what do you want for your company? Do you want to be the next Apple or the next Patagonia or the next. I don't know, big brand or do you want to stay small? And the beauty is you can stay small, it's fine, or you can grow. There's no wrong answer, but your approach should be in line with where you want to go, setting up your goals and then you know what tactics and what strategies you need to put in place to get there.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah, it's funny, I feel like this very question, to build a personal brand or a company brand, I feel like it's a tale as old as time. This kind of conundrum of mine is one that is shared by many other folks. I've had conversations with people over the years about this very thing. Yeah, so there's that. But what I do know to be true is people do business with those they know, like and trust. Right. Companies don't hire people and people don't hire companies. People hire people. So I feel like that, to me, is my kind of guiding light, is people do business with those they know, like and trust. So that's the first kind of box to start with. It's like the mindset piece always for me; that's the truth.
Jillian Vorce: That's the foundational piece to then step forward and then try to kind of grapple with where to allocate resources and how to think about it and all of those things. I think, yes, exactly what you said is thinking long term, big picture. Do you aspire to build a large business or do you not? I mean, does it mean a small business can be three people on a team and it can be 50 people on a team or whatever, but do you want to employ hundreds of thousands of people or not? Right. So there's that. But even to kind of distill that even further, I think there are some other kinds of questions to reflect on that help to, what you were talking about is to help kind of illuminate the strategy moving forward. Right.
Jillian Vorce: So what are your objectives and what are your target audiences exactly? Is your objective? Yeah. Are you trying to attract new leads or are you trying to attract new team members or speaking opportunities? Because I feel like a part of the strategy part is also platforms. And so you may exert your personal brand more or less on some platforms than others. Also, depending on what? Depending on your audience and objectives.
Veronica Guguian: And based on what you said now, it depends because from the beginning, the purpose, what I did with spin ideas, the goal in my communication was to educate people. Why do you need a marketing strategy? What is a marketing strategy? Because I realize people don't really understand that everyone when it comes to marketing what they know, it's Google Ads and Facebook ads. And to be honest, I'm kind of sick and tired of that discussion. So from the beginning, everything that I did was providing content for them to be educated. So you do need to use both brands to do that and speaking engagements. A company is not really speaking, a person is speaking. Right?
Jillian Vorce: Correct.
Veronica Guguian: So you are never going to ask a brand to come and speak, you're going to ask a specific person in that company because there are so many people, especially in big organizations and some of them, they are amazing speakers, some not so much, or maybe some are better reflecting the values of that brand that you like and want to have part of an event. So there are so many factors to consider and I don't think we can actually take the personal branding out of the company branding. And again, there's a differentiation between the micro and SMEs and the corporates. For the corporates it's a different approach. We don't really have a lot of corporates listening to us, so I'm not going to go too much into that. But especially for the micro and SMEs that we know, it's our main audience at this point.
Veronica Guguian: You can't take one out of the other, especially if you're a value-based company and a purpose-driven company, because then you are the main spokesperson of that brand, of your brand. So what you're talking about and what you're presenting needs to be in line with what the company is doing. I think you as an entrepreneur, you are the talk to go to my walk the talk. So you are the talk and the brand needs to be the walk. So you are going and sharing what you're doing, but then everything that you do under the brand of your company needs to be in line. You mentioned a couple of ago that you see on the walls of big companies, we value your opinion, but then they don't apply it. So for me, that's exactly what you shouldn't do.
Veronica Guguian: If you are going and say your opinion is valued, then go and show me organized events where you are taking into account and applying. Show me statistics. Applied what you said. Yeah, I think of it between those two.
Jillian Vorce: Sure. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, but I was like, yeah, I just realized, yeah, that's another thing, another conversation I've had with clients over the years is let's not tell them who your brand is, let's show them, let's demonstrate your brand. And so that to me is like, I feel like there's enough work just focusing on that. So let's evaluate, let's identify what your brand is and let's look for all the opportunities to demonstrate your brand values through all the facets of your business, the relationship with all of your stakeholders, et cetera. I feel like that in and of itself is great. Yeah, there you go. There's a way to build a business, just focus just on that and I.
Veronica Guguian: Think that will be much more authentic and it will actually show what you're doing. A lot of people are focusing on showing how great we are as a brand. I think if you're educating or providing value, you are achieving that goal, showing your grade way better than the other way around.
Jillian Vorce: So I mentioned earlier how so often the examples that are used for any branding decks or presentations or anything, anywhere, it's always Apple and Nike and the big companies. So I thought I would share one that people may or may not know, but I think it's quite relevant. So there's a web company based in Chicago in the US called Orbit Media and just for some data kind of metrics around this. So their LinkedIn page, for example, has about 8500 followers.
Veronica Guguian: Wow.
Jillian Vorce: But their co-founder and their CMO happens to be a friend of mine, this great guy named Andy. Andy's LinkedIn page has 54,000 followers. So he's very effectively building his personal brand, which is no surprise an extension of the company brand or vice versa because he's the co-founder. But people are very interested in learning from others, connecting with others, seeing who they are, and getting to know them. And so he's doing a fantastic job of helping his company get on the radar of more people through building his personal brand. And there's not a lot of gap between his personal brand and the company brand. It's very much in alignment. So, I'll include the links to those in the show notes. You can just have a look.
Jillian Vorce: So I feel like that's more relatable than us trying to aspire to grow like Apple or Nike or something.
Veronica Guguian: And I think that's a nice way to get to the close of the episode because what better way to show how to achieve that than to give a great example so people understand because we keep on discussing. Actually, not only us, but in general, keep on discussing without really providing examples. It is very hard to make it concrete. So I love the fact that you actually came up with this idea to share.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah, I have a couple of other articles I've also read on the topic. I'll include those in the show notes, just other perspectives. I'm somebody I love with different perspectives on things. I read a lot, I listen to a lot of podcasts, I have a lot of conversations, and I'm really curious always to learn what people do, but more importantly, why they do what they do. So some of these articles might be helpful for folks who are also trying to kind of crack this nut between personal and company branding. Yes.
Veronica Guguian: And there are companies that do it without the personnel. Actually, if I'm honest and if we really look, I don't think you can do one without the other for small companies because when you are going and presenting your company, it's you as a person going and presenting it. So that means you're building your personal branding as well. So if you are really going very deep inside, you can't have one without the other. Now the question is how much you put them in balance. And that can depend, like looking at spin. What I did at the beginning was 50. Now I have to say it's more on the company side because my brands grew quite a lot. But actually it's not really true because people still come to me or introduce me, even if I'm so actively promoting my personal branding.
Veronica Guguian: But my personal branding grew quite a lot and I'm still doing it through my events. When I'm going, I'll introduce myself and then what I'm doing. So ideas are an extension of me, of what I do, but it's not me if that makes sense. So it will be, what's the word I'm looking for? They do live together, those two, so you can't take one.
Jillian Vorce: Cohabiting.
Veronica Guguian: Cohabiting. Thank you so much. Yes. You can't have one without the other, basically. But I feel the focus is shifting. So sometimes you put more focus on your personal branding and less on your company, especially at the beginning, and then it starts changing and a specific point is more balanced. Or there are moments when it's more towards your personal one and moments where it's more towards your company one.
Jillian Vorce: No, I think 100% that it kind of ebbs and flows. I think this is an example. It is a bit of an art and a science, I think both, yeah. And there are situational things and whatnot. The last piece I'm just going toss into the equation because I think it's relevant and I actually think there's a lot of opportunity and it can be a sticking point for businesses is the team side because so much of our conversation is about us as the business owners, how do we handle our personal brand versus our company? But then there's also the team piece. And I think this piece is underutilized, I feel like it is botched too often.
Jillian Vorce: And so I think there's a lot of opportunity to kind of unpack the role of our employees or our teams in seeing, for example, are there folks that are on our team that also aspire to have personal brands? Or maybe they do have personal brands and ways to kind of get out in front of that and to collaborate and strategize with them. And then another way to also look at that is opportunities to help, again, demonstrate your brand. Right. Because it speaks volumes if you have other people on your team out representing your company as opposed to just you. There's an association. Yeah, exactly. So I think a lot of businesses don't see it this way.
Jillian Vorce: And I think too often a lot of business owners tend to have some ego or just lack of awareness or some fear or all these other things that get in the way from actually stepping into more of an abundance growth strategy of elevating our team and having our team out there and promoting them to represent our company. So I just had to tuck this in there because it's a combination of personal and company branding.
Veronica Guguian: I'm super happy you placed it. And I think a lot of us tend to see our company as our baby. And I think when you really start, it could be healthy, but long term, it's very unhealthy to keep on thinking like that because then it's hard for you to share the spotlight. Let's say you do need to share the spotlight. You really want to do that because that means it's exactly like strategic partnerships. You are tapping into a new audience, a new market, you're increasing your visibility and you're increasing the value you can provide and the value of your company. So why wouldn't you do that? However, if you're not able to let go, and it's a lot about the ego you lose in the end because you stay small, you'll not be able to grow.
Veronica Guguian: And if you want to grow, you can't do it alone.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah. And honestly, this is one of the, I would say, most common stumbling blocks I have seen in working with businesses over the years with varying degrees of awareness around this topic. But often, too often, I think business owners have a tendency to suffocate any innovation or growth. And a lot of times, there's not awareness about that. They are just so intimate with their idea, their baby, that they just have a resistance to loosening the grip and letting it breathe and letting other people inject their ideas and energy into it as well. I think that there's a lot to that and it's a very common misstep. And then also just the ego piece of being the one Always.
Jillian Vorce: And if you're always the one, that's not going to inspire other people to want to elevate because they're going to keep banging their heads on you. And you became a business owner. Yeah. You, the business owner, often become the very disabler of growth. Disable is the opposite of enable. Right.
Veronica Guguian: I think, yeah.
Jillian Vorce: This is grammar lesson number two for today. Yeah. So I think that is very typical. And I've seen it a lot of times where the business, they say they want to grow in all the things except for that their leadership has to also grow or they actually need.
Veronica Guguian: To.
Jillian Vorce: Hire that they don't really have.
Veronica Guguian: And if you look like you kept on mentioning the big brands like Apple and Patagonia, for example, Apple at a specific point, they had to fire deep jobs in order to be able to grow at a specific point. You do need us as founders, and I'm not talking about entrepreneurs, but us as founders. At this specific point, we need either to take ourselves out or allow other influences. Otherwise, we'll not be able to grow because we have just one way of seeing things. And growth means different perspectives and different approaches.
Jillian Vorce: And also sustainability and longevity.
Veronica Guguian: Exactly.
Jillian Vorce: Cool.
Veronica Guguian: That's actually a nice way to end this episode. What do you think?
Jillian Vorce: I think so. I feel like all good makes sense. Personal versus company branding. The takeaway is yes, and.
Veronica Guguian: Yeah, I like that. That should be our title.
Jillian Vorce: Yeah, exactly. Perfect. Let's do that. All right, so that's a wrap on 22.
Veronica Guguian: That's a wrap on 22. Thank you all for listening. And actually, I'm curious to hear how our listeners are approaching this. Yes. And or is just one way or the other.
Jillian Vorce: And why?
Veronica Guguian: And why? Very important. Thank you all for tuning in, till next time.
Jillian Vorce: Cheers.