Big Idea Brand Marketing

11/01/2024

Have you got a word, words or a phrase that will inspire, encourage and expand the who of you and your brand in 2024?

I’ve been working with a word for my year for several years now, and when I’ve chosen my word, I often find that a colour appears for me too.

By one of those strange quirks of synchronicity, I’d chosen my word and then a friend told me about Susannah Conway and how she used her approach to get to her choice.

I was curious about this (curiosity is one of my values) and downloaded the PDFs for finding your word and developing your intentions for the year.

This is what I like about Susannah’s approach:

⭐Encourages you to trust your intuition.

⭐Prompts your curiosity by asking:

➡️How - this word makes you feel.
➡️Why - this is what you need.
➡️What - you will do differently if you embody this word.
➡️What - you could do daily to anchor the word into your routine.

What’s your view? Could a word or phrase be useful and meaningful as you develop your intentions for 2024?

Here's the link if you want to download the PDFs https://www.susannahconway.com/unravel

20/12/2023

Today is the day that the delightfully daring Debora Luzi will interview me as part of her series on " Women Who Dare to Desire" for her " Women Who Dare to Desire - The SHOW."

Debora’s aim with the show is to create a magical mix of inspiration and motivation for women business owners who dare to desire.

It’s a short interview – no longer than 30 minutes – and she asks every guest to share the journey, along with some enlightening wisdom and a magic question. ⭐

The interview will be LIVE today - Wednesday, 20th December at 1.45pm GMT on Facebook on Debora’s page https://www.facebook.com/deboraluzicoachingandhealing/
and in her Women who dare to desire group.

I'm looking forward to the chat and still working on my magical question - what would be your ‘what if’ question to spark daring thoughts?

12/01/2023

Delighted to see Victoria talking about her rebranding of Perfect Cuppa English to Culture Cuppa.

In this post she talks about the reasons for the rebrand, including:

⭐ Outgrown the previous name
⭐ Had grown a new client base
⭐ Evolved the scope of the brand from its roots in English to improving communication and working with cultural sensitivity

Proud to say that Big Idea Brand Marketing helped Victoria through her rebranding process - and it was a joy to work with her.

We covered the 3 core stages:

⭐ Clarifying who the brand is and what it stands for
⭐ Clarifying the core target audiences, the value proposition for each and brand messaging
⭐ Creating the visual identity including logo, colour palette and font family, and marketing collateral including business card and documents

And then providing a handy summary and reference with the Brand Style Guide.

Our talented friend Karen Black at HubFizz created the website alongside.

Culture Cuppa is all set to flourish and grow 😍

Big News- Introducing Culture Cuppa

I am very excited to share that today marks a very special moment- a new ‘birthday’ for my business, as we relaunch as Culture Cuppa: www.culturecuppa.com

This has been an evolution that has been in process for a while in the background, and I knew that this was the year that I needed to move forward and take a bold step to fully realise my vision for this business.

Our purpose is to create an equal share of voice for all in multicultural and multilingual teams.

The mission we set out to achieve is to help ambitious international leaders and teams to achieve their performance and career dreams with our communication and culture coaching and training​ programmes.

We want you and your team to feel able to share your voice and expertise spontaneously, speak up authentically with your full personality, and develop your cultural intelligence​ for improved ways of working.

This means you will expand your confidence and visibility​, build connections and develop relationships within your global team and externally with customers​, that increase your impact and influence​.

Ultimately, this results in delivering your projects more efficiently and on time, working exceptionally well together as high-performing individuals in the team​, and developing strong connections with your customers.

We do this through our bespoke programmes, which combine a framework designed for results with specific tailoring to your needs and circumstances, including our signature coaching and training programmes:

- 9 Steps to Communication Confidence: Improve your communication confidence in English.
- Productive Global Team Communication: Enhance your team’s communication, connection and rapport.
- Cross-Cultural Success: Develop cultural intelligence for successful global projects.

I will be sharing more about our journey and why the change in the next few days, in the meantime…

Goodbye Perfect Cuppa English, Hello Culture Cuppa!

I would love you to check out our new website here: https://culturecuppa.com

02/12/2022

Huge thank you to Sheree Owen for her recent testimonial. It was a real pleasure to work with you.
“I recently completed a Brand Audit with Lynne and what an absolutely brilliant experience it was. It really highlighted where I could easily make some shifts and changes to my brand positioning and alignment. The session was very valuable, as Lynne's approach is dedicated and detailed. I came away with so many ideas and insights which are now being put into action. Lynne really is a brand specialist and asks insightful questions that let you think through the concept she is discussing and has picked up on. Highly recommend this to anyone feeling that perhaps their brand messaging or positioning needs a refresh, or just to get ideas and the benefit of Lynne's wisdom.” Sheree Owen – The Sales Strategist

30/11/2022

Interbrand has published their 100 Best Global Brands Report for 2022 🤔
This year they’ve placed a huge emphasis on leadership and actions, naming the report ‘Brands as Acts of Leadership’.

There’s a lot of fascinating analysis in it to absorb. And I feel it verifies the work I’m doing to help small business owners:

⭐ Build brands that make a difference through their purpose, vision and mission
⭐ Who connect and grow affinity with their clients based on their values and actions
⭐ And the importance of creating a distinctive brand with personality and humanity

Here are the criteria that Interbrand use:

Internal Factors: Leadership
👉🏼 Direction: The degree to which there is a clear purpose and ambition for the brand.
👉🏼 Alignment: The degree to which the whole organization is pulling in the same direction.
👉🏼 Empathy: The degree to which the organization is in tune with customers and wider stakeholders.
👉🏼 Agility: The speed to market that a company demonstrates in the face of opportunity or challenge, enabling it to get ahead and stay ahead of expectations.

External Factors: Engagement
👉🏼 Distinctiveness: The existence of uniquely ownable signature assets and experiences.
👉🏼 Coherence: The degree to which customer interactions, while varying depending on channel and context, remain authentic to the brand’s narrative and feel.
👉🏼 Participation: The degree to which the brand has the ability to draw in customers and partners.

External Factors: Relevance
👉🏼 Presence: The degree to which a brand feels omnipresent to relevant audiences, is talked about positively.
👉🏼 Trust: The extent to which a brand is seen to deliver against the (high) expectations that customers have of it.
👉🏼 Affinity: The degree to which customers feel a positive connection with the brand, based on the functional and/or emotional benefits provided, and/or a sense of having shared values.

Are there any factors that stand out for you in your own brand building?

28/11/2022

“Get yourselves organised down there”

If you’ve ever seen ‘A Close Shave’ the Wallace and Gromit film featuring sheep rustling, Preston the cyber dog, the scary Mutton-O-Matic, the wondrous Knit-O-Matic and of course Shaun the Sheep, you’ll hear these words in the distinctive tone of Peter Sallis / Wallace.

He tells the sheep rescued from rustling to get themselves organised on the motorbike and they create a perfect formation – it’s a chuckle moment.

I often hear Wallace’s voice in my head when I want to organise my thoughts or get something sorted.

It’s down to earth, calming and makes me smile, especially if the organising is a bit challenging.

I’m working on getting myself organised on a few things now, one of them being 2023 brand marketing plans and processes.

And in synchronicity worked with a client on these yesterday too!
It’s almost a Marketing-O-Matic!

Other phrases that bring a smile from A Close Shave include ‘not even Wensleydale’ and ‘He's malfunctioning’

What’s your favourite Wallace and Gromit phrase?

25/11/2022

What does integrity mean to you? 🤔

We were talking about values and how these are attraction, affinity and standout elements of your business.

Integrity comes up a lot, along with honesty - and after the discussion yesterday I’m inclined to the view that integrity embraces honesty in its meaning.

The New Oxford Dictionary has these definitions and examples:

👉🏼 Integrity (noun) —the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness e.g. a woman of complete integrity
👉🏼 The state of being whole and undivided e.g. upholding territorial integrity

Our discussion also reminded me of what Jonathan Stark has written recently about the meaning of integrity. He quoted these quotes:

⭐ “Integrity is choosing your thoughts and actions based on values rather than personal gain.” Chris Karcher

⭐ “Integrity is doing as you say you would do even when no one is watching.” Oprah Winfrey

These quotes illustrate the conclusion of our conversation about values, using integrity as an example.

Namely that whilst it’s great to use one word to identify the values that are most meaningful, inspiring and essential to your business, brand and personal behaviours. It’s even more important to go beyond your one-word summary and to write your own paragraph.

By creating your individual explanation of what this value means to your brand and how your business lives it daily, you’ll light the spark that creates ‘aha’ moments of affinity.

Have you used more than one word to describe what your brand values mean to your business and activities?

23/11/2022

“Help people you like get what they want” 😊

It made me smile when I read it last week in a Jonathan Stark piece.

Of course, there are lots of parameters – practical, ethical, purposeful, and so on.

It assumes:
👉🏼 You know who you like and what they want (and need)
👉🏼 You do no harm to people and planet
👉🏼 They find your business when they want help
👉🏼 Your help superbly satisfies what they want
👉🏼 At fees they happily pay
👉🏼 Whilst you make the profit you want

Would you add anything else for your brand?

21/11/2022

Where do you start? 🤔
When you want to kickstart your offers and things are changing.

It’s always a good idea to think about your clients, especially the ones you connect with, enjoy working with and develop ideas and programmes for, that make their lives better - your soul clients.

Then you work on refining your brand attraction factor and making your brand human, so that clients feel affinity and aligned with your values and purpose.

Liz Carabine and I have been working with clients on these elements in our Inspiring Soul Affinity Programme.

It’s a flexible programme for a small group of business owners who want to feel aligned and in tune with the heart, mind, and soul of your business - because soul gives depth, dimension, and meaning to your brand – your purpose and values, as well as your brand personality, colours and messaging.

In January 2023 we start Module 3 - Express Your Soul Calling in Your Business.

There are 3 sessions plus a review session to help you to express your vitality, purpose and passion throughout your business communications.

You’ll discover:

⭐ The energies of your spirit animal
⭐ Your expressive colours, style and imagery and
⭐ Access the power of your voice and make your mark

The sessions will help express your brand promise throughout uncertain times and shine brightly, like the north star to attract your soul clients.

Each 90 minutes session includes guided meditations, guidance for your soul business uplevelling and ignites vital soul to soul discussions.

See the link for more information - https://bit.ly/3hGYlki