by Theresa Cifali, CEO & Founder of Daily Achievers
I Felt Like a Fake
As I looked in the mirror I thought, “Who is that?”
I’d just gotten ready for my first real photo shoot but the woman looking back at me wasn’t me.
A business suit.
Hair pinned up in a bun.
Too much makeup.
Professional? Perhaps. There was a big problem though — I looked fake.
If I was being honest, I felt fake. There wasn’t anything about my new coaching business that felt authentically me. I felt as though I was playing a part in someone else’s business. It didn’t feel good.
As a matter of fact, everything about my business didn’t feel good. Actually, it felt hard. It was difficult to:
Make decisions
Create content
Be consistent
Have confidence
Attract my ideal client
It was painfully clear. The persona I had created was not in tune with who I am or what I value. More importantly, it didn’t align with the freedom and flexibility that my ideal client desired.
Instead, I'd cobbled together what I “thought” professional would look and sound like, which made me come across as uptight, unapproachable and arrogant. I certainly didn't come across as a coach who cared or was going to help you be more productive and make business easier.
Branding Improves Productivity
Once I got super clear on what it meant to build a personality brand, everything in my business got easier. The lessons I learned not only helped me love my business, but improved my productivity.
You’re thinking, “Huh? Branding improves productivity?”
Absolutely!
Productivity means doing what's effective in an efficient manner. In other words, it’s doing the right work with as little effort as possible. The right work for your business is the strategies, tactics and tasks that actually help you make progress on your goals.
While your goals should inform your actions, so should your brand.
The Benefits of Branding on Productivity
When you have a rock solid brand, it will help save you time and make business easier.
Branding helps you be productive in the following ways:
1. Easier Decision Making
You make decisions every single day. Some choices are easy to make, while others are infinitely harder. Who wants to make the wrong choice? Right?
While I won’t tell you that you’ll always make the right decisions in business (or life for that matter), a clear brand will make decision-making faster and easier.
Your brand should help inform the answer to the question, “should I do this?” The answer should be yes IF it both aligns with your brand and helps you make progress on your goals.
Then, next time you feel stuck and don’t know what decision to make, ask yourself, “does this action make sense for my brand?”
The ability to make quick decisions using your goals and your brand as guidelines will help you say yes to the right things and avoid the things that ultimately waste time and energy. That’s productive.
2. Quicker Content Creation
Content creation is something you’re likely doing as a business owner.
No matter what type of content you create, be it a blog post, a graphic, a slide deck, etc., there are choices to be made. What visual elements will you use? What colors? Which fonts? What topic will you talk about? What will you say in your copy?
All of this is time consuming.
A clear brand personality will help you create your content more quickly. Branding makes it easier to:
Stick to relevant topics for your ideal customer
Distill your thoughts into clear language that resonates
Share valuable ideas in meaningful ways
Choose visual elements that make sense
Demonstrate consistency in the look and tone of your content
When the right content comes together more quickly it’s a productivity win.
3. Consistency Feels Effortless
It can be a challenge to stay consistent in business under the best of circumstances.
I’m not just talking about showing up on social media or blogging regularly, I’m also referring to consistency in your messaging and your look. When someone comes to your website or your Instagram account, will they get what you do and how you help? Or will be they be confused?
When you stick to your branding, you’ll be much more productive. Maintaining a harmonious look, feel, tone, message and more reduces the decisions you need to make which helps you get more done and makes it easier to show up on a regular basis.
Additionally, a great brand helps you create the right content for the right people. When you focus on the right work in the right way, that’s a productivity at it’s best.
Keep Your Brand in Mind To Improve Productivity
Productivity improves when you do what’s effective in an efficient way. You can improve your effectiveness and efficiency even more when you consider your branding. That is to say, so much is made easier when sticking to your brand.
Decision-making, content creation and consistency are only a few components that can improve when keeping your brand in mind though. So, always look to your brand when looking to be more productive in business. Let it be your North Star.
Theresa Cifali believes that when you do only what truly matters in your business, you win every day. She's a Productivity Coach and the CEO & Founder of Daily Achievers™ LLC, where she helps coaches, content creators and solopreneurs get clear on what they want so they can focus their actions and make real progress. Theresa offers private coaching, group programs and digital products. Theresa also co-hosts The Messy Desk Podcast where she and Meghan Monaghan discuss everything marketing productivity. You can find her anywhere you listen to podcasts.