Timestamps:

00:00:00 The Power of Branding
The host lists eight benefits of strong branding, such as higher conversion rates, repeat purchases, and lower acquisition costs.

00:01:01 What is Branding?
The host introduces the topic of branding and a 16-step framework for building a brand for your e-commerce business.

00:02:11 Custom GPT and Resources
The host mentions a custom GPT and slides available to help listeners implement the 16-step framework discussed in the episode.

00:03:11 Host Introduction
Josh Hadley introduces himself, his e-commerce experience, and his podcast, E-com Breakthrough, for e-commerce entrepreneurs.

00:04:12 Brand vs. Product Acquisition Machine
The host differentiates between building a true brand and simply operating a product acquisition or arbitrage business, common on Amazon.

00:07:06 What a Brand Is
A brand builds trust, optimizes for customer retention, focuses on long-term growth, and is difficult for competitors to copy.

00:10:53 How Brands Compound
The host explains how brands create a compounding effect through customer trust, repeat purchases, word-of-mouth, and easier product launches.

00:12:43 The 16-Step Brand Framework Introduction
An overview of the three phases of the branding framework: defining the brand, expressing it, and compounding its value.

00:13:43 Step 1: Choose Your Primary Customer
A strong brand serves a niche customer. Defining this avatar makes all other branding decisions much easier.

00:17:40 Step 2: Choose the Outcome You Own
Customers buy products to achieve an aspirational identity. Brands must own the outcome their product provides, not just the product.

00:23:48 Step 3: Choose Your Associations
A brand is built by repeatedly connecting your company to a small number of desirable ideas, words, or phrases.

00:26:54 Step 4: Write the Brand Promise
Combine your customer, outcome, and approach into a clear internal statement that serves as a decision-making tool for your business.

00:28:02 Step 5: Define What the Brand Is Not
Brands become clearer through exclusion. Deciding what your brand refuses to be is as important as defining what it is.

00:30:06 Step 6: Choose Your Hero Product
Your hero product is the clear entry point that teaches customers what your company means and establishes your brand’s identity.

00:33:05 Step 7: Make the Product Remarkable
The product experience earns the second purchase. A remarkable product builds durable trust and generates powerful word-of-mouth marketing.

00:34:25 Step 8: Create a Recognizable Brand Identity
Define your brand’s personality through one of three models: founder-led, a brand character, or a design-led identity.

00:39:34 Step 9: Build a Distinctive Visual and Verbal World
Design makes your brand’s meaning easier to recognize. Your brand should be identifiable even without its logo.

00:40:26 Step 10: Audit the Current Customer Experience
Every customer encounter either reinforces or contradicts your brand promise. Audit all touchpoints, from packaging to social media.

00:47:34 Step 11: Reinforce Through Trusted Associations
Borrow trust by deliberately pairing your brand with people, organizations, or communities that already represent your brand’s core values.

01:02:29 Step 12: Repeat the Same Meaning Consistently
Brands are built through consistent repetition. While campaigns can change, the core meaning and message must remain recognizable over time.

01:05:36 Step 13: Build the Next Purchase into the Brand
Map the customer journey to create a logical product ecosystem that guides customers from one purchase to the next.

01:08:23 Step 14: Align Every Customer Touchpoint
The brand is the total experience. Ensure every interaction, from advertising to customer support, reinforces your brand promise without contradiction.

01:13:36 Step 15: Run a Monthly Brand Review
Conduct a monthly review to prevent brand drift, track key metrics, and ensure all activities align with your brand strategy.

01:21:16 Step 16: Protect and Compound the Meaning
Brand building is ongoing. Use a brand extension test before launching new products to ensure they reinforce your core meaning.

01:24:41 Final Thoughts and Call to Action
The host summarizes the framework, offers a custom GPT and slides, and asks listeners to share and review the podcast.

Links and Mentions:

Tools and Resources
“Custom GPT for Brand Building“: “00:02:11”
“Ecomm Breakthrough YouTube Channel“: “00:09:58”

Notable Concepts and Frameworks
“16-Step Framework for Branding“: “00:12:43”

Brands and Examples Mentioned
“Boom Beauty“: “00:14:45”
“AG1“: “00:15:46”
“Liquid Death“: “00:16:39”
“Patagonia“: “00:22:41”
“Rolex“: “00:22:41”
“Apple“: “00:22:41”

Videos and Content
“Andrew Huberman on AG1“: “00:45:35”
“Liquid Death’s Marketing Campaigns“: “00:45:35”

Call to Action
“Leave a Review”: “01:24:41”
“Share the Episode”: “01:24:41”

Transcript:

Josh Hadley 00:00:00  Today, I want to start by asking you a series of questions. Number one, how would you like a higher conversion rate on your product listings? Number two, how would you like more repeat purchases for your product? Number three, how would you like an increase in search volume for your actual brand? Number four, how would you like to launch products more easily and help them become more successful and established more quickly? Number five, how would you like to lower your customer acquisition cost, or the amount that you have to spend on ads in order to actually make a sale? Number six, how would you like to have more customers that are willing to pay a premium for your product compared to the competitors? And number seven, how would you like to have less sales erosion from all the overseas competitors or all the other competitors that are trying to knock you off, or that are just simply playing the price game with race to the bottom pricing. And last but not least, how would you like to have less dependence on discounts or even on certain marketplaces? If you answered yes to any of those questions, well, you’re in good hands because today I’m going to be sharing with you the answer to all of these questions.

Josh Hadley 00:01:01  And most importantly, it comes down to one simple answer and it comes down to branding. So what is branding? Today I’m going to be diving into what a brand is, what it is not. But most importantly, I’m going to be sharing a 16 step framework that will allow you to not only understand what a brand is, but how to architect a brand and actually implement it for your own business so that you can capture more premium paying customers so that you can capture more repeat purchases and ultimately be able to survive and thrive as a business. Welcome to the Ecomm Breakthrough Podcast. I’m Josh Hadley. I’ve scaled my own ecommerce brand from 0 to 8 figures, and I’m actively building towards nine figures in sales. This podcast is where I document that journey and share the systems, the strategies, and the lessons learned in real time so that you can learn what actually matters and scale your own business. I want to give a disclaimer before we get going because this is a meaty episode. There is so much content that is in here that I would encourage you to not only don’t listen to this on two x speed, maybe you can, but make sure you’re you’re going to go back through this thing and take it step by step.

Josh Hadley 00:02:11  and the reason I say that is because I myself use this entire 16 step framework in order to craft my own brand, and it has made a world of difference. And honestly, my wife and I spent weeks, if not months architecting all of this. This is not a one shot. Hey, watch this, follow this. You’re going to implement it in one day. This is something that can be truly game changing for your business. Now to make your life easier, guess what? I’ve actually got a custom GPT that I created that will help you walk through this entire process in an easier fashion. It will go step by step and then it will produce your next action plan. It will be a thoughtful, help like thought partner for you and help you articulate the true brand that you need to become. So stay to the end. That’s where I share the custom GPT instructions. And also, there’s a chance for you to get the slides as well. So hang with me as we dive through this.

Josh Hadley 00:03:11  But just know there’s a little, cookie out there for you if you listen to this to the very end. So who am I? My name is Josh Hadley. First and foremost, I’m a man of faith. I’m a husband to a beautiful wife and a father of four children. I’ve been selling in the e-commerce space for over a decade now, doing over $20 million in annual revenue and doing multi-millionaire on channels such as Shopify, TikTok shop and Amazon. I’m also the host of the number one business strategy podcast for ecommerce entrepreneurs, and that is E-com breakthrough. So as we dive in today, I want you to ask yourself this question. Are you building a brand or actually a product acquisition machine right now? Because here’s what I hear repeatedly over and over again. Most e-commerce founders say that they have a brand. But just because you have a trademark. Just because you have a Shopify storefront, or just because you have a brand listed on Amazon and you have a brand storefront on Amazon, does not mean you have a brand, even if you have A+ content or any of that stuff.

Josh Hadley 00:04:12  That’s not what branding is. But here’s the question if the customer only buys once because they saw you ranked on Amazon, or you had the best coupon or the best deal, or you just randomly showed up in a TikTok video or you just had the fastest shipping, you may not actually have a brand yet, and we’re going to be diving into the difference between what is a brand versus what is a product acquisition machine. So are you actually building a brand or an arbitrage machine? So number one, here’s what an arbitrage business looks like. And here’s what happens. And guess what? I would argue 95% of all Amazon sellers are just in the arbitrage business. There’s nothing more nothing less. Now they’re not just arbitrage products that they find at retail stores. They are actually creating a private label. And I don’t want to say the word brand because they’re not true brands. They are private label products at the end of the day, but they are not brands. So in arbitrage business, which is where, frankly speaking, most of us started, including myself, it was, hey, can I go find this niche or opportunity on Amazon? Okay, great.

Josh Hadley 00:05:15  Let me go build this product for this thing. And what I was looking for was just an arbitrage opportunity. Hey, where is there? Kind of like blue ocean in the Amazon ecosystem. And then how do I go create a product that serves that need or those keywords? Okay, so here’s what an arbitrage business does. It buys clicks right. That’s your Amazon PPC. It optimizes for your customer acquisition cost, which is hey, can I just pay. You know, how many clicks does it take for PPC until I get a sale. Can I do that profitably? What are my tacos? That’s what you’re focused on when you’re just an arbitrage business. Okay, I’m just looking to make a sale today. I’m not worried about the future. I just want the money today, okay? The products are driving revenue, and there’s not necessarily a brand that’s driving it. So what you’ll often find with these arbitrage businesses is that, like there’s products in very different categories and you don’t have to I’m preaching to the choir here because we have products that we’re serving.

Josh Hadley 00:06:09  You know, kind of like end of life, you know, funerals to people that were celebrating baby showers. So we had products that were all over the place. And ultimately it was because I just found keyword opportunities on Amazon, pure and simple. And last but not least, here’s what here’s what’s hard about arbitrage businesses. They are very easy to copy. Okay. And so if you’re listening to this and you’re feeling the pressure, as I have on Amazon, where it feels like Amazon continues to court these overseas sellers, okay. And they’re really like just trying to bring down the cost at the end of the day. And so all these overseas competitors, the only playbook they know how to run is how do I just lower the price? It’s race to the bottom pricing, and oftentimes they’re not even in it for the profit. They’re in it for a myriad of other factors tax benefits, kickbacks from the government. And so like the playing field is not equal. And so the arbitrage opportunity on Amazon was a great way to go.

Josh Hadley 00:07:06  Make some quick cash, go make a quick buck. But I don’t think it was ever meant to be a oh, this is a legacy business. This is something I could pass down to my children. Now, on the flip side, the opposite is true for a brand. A brand is truly something that if you wanted to create legacy wealth, this is something that actually could be passed down for generations to come. This is also arguably something that actually makes a significant impact in society. Now it could have a negative impact, but it could also make a very positive impact. Whereas products just kind of like serve an intended purpose for a brief period of time, but don’t really pull people to a higher level of thinking or doing. So let’s talk about what a brand is. Okay. So a brand builds trust like pure and simple. At the end of the day, you could actually replace the word brand with trust. And I think like you’ve basically tied it up with a bow. Now we’re going to be talking about how to actually build that trust with customers to where they’re willing to pay a premium.

Josh Hadley 00:08:04  They come back to you. It’s lowering your customer acquisition cost. You don’t need to spend so much on ads. Okay, we’ll talk all about that. But here’s what a brand does. It optimizes for retention of the customer. Whereas in arbitrage business on Amazon primarily was like, hey, can I just get somebody in the door, I don’t care, like what necessarily their experiences with my product, as long as they don’t leave me a negative review. Right? That’s ultimately like the thought process going on in the arbitrage entrepreneur’s mind, whereas a brand owner is thinking about how do I optimize retention for not just like today’s sell, but for next month’s sell, and for six months after that and then years? Okay. They’re optimizing for decades of retention, not just today’s sale. Okay. A brand wants to win over the next ten years. It’s has a much longer time horizon of thinking rather than just the here and now. Okay. The customers are driving the revenue, not the products. So notice the difference here between an arbitrage business and a brand.

Josh Hadley 00:09:03  Customers drive the revenue for a brand, whereas products and opportunities drive the revenue for an arbitrage business. Growth will compound in a brand because there’s loyalty. And guess what? Brands are extremely difficult to copy. Nobody’s going to be like, come up tomorrow and say, oh, hey, I just knocked off Red bull. It’s like, if you’re knocking off Red bull, I hope you have decades of experience investing in different partnerships and sponsorships that have built your moat. That is Red bull today. So the value that comes from a brand doesn’t come from the products. It actually comes from the number of customers who trust you enough to buy the next thing. So I’m sharing my screen here. If you’re listening to the audio version of this, I would highly recommend you come check out Ecomm Breakthrough on YouTube, where I actually have a presentation. And today I’ve got so many examples that are going to be very visual that you’re going to want to see of other brands, how they’re implementing this or how they’re implementing that.

Josh Hadley 00:09:58  And so come check this out on YouTube if you’re listening to the audio version, but you can see here if you’re watching this, I have a little diagram that talks about how you actually build value as a brand. So here’s what happens. Yes, you do need to have a product if you’re a brand, okay. But the product then sells to a customer. That customer then either gained your trust or they don’t. Right? Then they’re willing to buy the next product and the next product and the next product. And that ultimately is what a brand becomes. So if you were to boil it down to like the synthesis of all of this, it can I sell a product that truly delivers on a promise that customers then trust me enough to say, wow, this is so good. Whatever this brand comes out with next. I’m a believer. I’m a buyer. I’m I’m a writer die fan. And then they keep buying on repeat over and over and over again. That’s where brand equity comes into play.

Josh Hadley 00:10:53  Okay. A product can create a customer, but a brand a brand creates a customer who buys future products. So notice that difference. So here’s why brands compound. So number one you have an ad. It leads to a first purchase. Then hopefully that’s an exceptional product that you’ve put together that then leads to customer trust. Then it leads to that repeat purchase. And guess what. After that, if a customer keeps buying and buying from you, they’re going to be talking about it. That’s going to be word of mouth with their friends. Guess what? That word of mouth leads to a lower acquisition cost for your customers. Okay, less ad spend because your customers are actually spreading the word for you. Okay, that then comes into a higher lifetime value of a customer and launches then become easier if you’re coming out with a new product, and that’s ultimately what a brand becomes. Now we’ve talked about what a brand, we’ve talked about, what a brand is not, and we also talked about how most people that got started on Amazon were just in the customer acquisition game.

Josh Hadley 00:11:51  Okay. You are not actually building a brand. You are just playing an arbitrage opportunity. That’s what I was doing. Now it’s all about building a brand, because what I am set to become is a nine figure brand. In order to become a nine figure brand. You have to build customer trust. You have to have repeat purchases. You have to be able to command premium pricing from customers. And if you can’t do that, then you’re just kind of stuck, as stuck as an arbitrage business, and you’re going to be easy to knock off, and you’re going to wonder, why do my sales go down year over year when there’s just a flood and sea of overseas competitors coming into my area? So let’s dive into the real meat and potatoes for today. How to actually create a brand. I’ve got a 16 step framework that I’m going to be sharing with you today what a brand actually is. Okay. Your brand is not just your logo. It’s not just packaging, it’s not colors. It’s not just products, and it’s not just advertising, okay? What a brand is.

Josh Hadley 00:12:43  It’s the collection of associations that customers attach to your company and how those associations change the customer behavior. So pure and simple, that is the overarching thing. We talked about trust previously, but now we’re going to talk about how to actually build that trust. And that trust is built through associations. And we’re going to talk about how to build those associations so that you actually become trusted by your customers so that you can begin this brand journey. So the brand framework, I would argue it boils down to three different phases. So number one, you’ve got to define what your brand is, establish who you are, what you are for what you mean, and what you refuse to be. Deciding who you are not is just as important as who you are. Phase number two is going to be all about expressing yourself. This is going to be translating strategy into your actual product, your identity, and the customer experience. And then phase number three is all about compounding everything that you’ve worked on in phases one and two on repeat.

Josh Hadley 00:13:43  How do you protect it and how do you actually measure whether your brand and how do you actually measure brand, whether that’s growing or decreasing over time? So let’s dive into phase number one. Phase number one is all about defining the brand. Before you express anything, you must choose what you stand for, who you serve, and what you are deliberately going to say. Who you are not. So step number one is you have to you have to choose your primary customer. Okay. A strong brand does not serve everybody. To be honest with you, every strong brand that exists out in the market today is going to be polarizing. It’s going to serve a very niche subset of customers. And so your products may serve multiple segments. But one primary customer should drive your positioning, your product priorities, your creative direction, all of your partnerships, your content, your customer experience. And so the more precisely that you are able to define who your primary customer is, every other decision for your brand becomes so much easier.

Josh Hadley 00:14:45  I want to share with you three specific examples of other brands so that you can clearly understand, like they have honed in on one very specific avatar. And it’s not just everybody, even though that could be the simple answer. Everybody needs my products. That’s the wrong. That’s the wrong mindset. So here’s a few examples. Number one. Boom. Okay boom beauty. This used to be boom by Cindy Joseph. This is some. This is a brand that Ezra Firestone owns and manages. Okay. So who is their customer avatar. Who’s their primary customer? It’s mature women. Okay. Who want to feel attractive without being told. Aging is a defect. Okay. They are not marketing to teenagers, and they’re not marketing to women in their 20s or 30s. Okay. It is all about mature women. So that is boom beauty. AG one another really good example. Okay. They are specifically targeting health conscious adult who want to support their health without managing a complicated supplement routine. So they’re really targeting people that actually care about their health.

Josh Hadley 00:15:46  They’re not trying to serve everybody. They’re like, hey, who are the people that actually care about their health? That’s that’s who I’m going after liquid death. They are going after consumers. This is probably the broadest audience, if you will. But yeah, it’s targeted. And again, I want to share these examples just so that you can kind of get a a frame of mindset as to like what can work for your own business. Okay. Liquid death consumers who identify more with entertainment, comedy and a rebellious culture than traditional wellness marketing. So while AG one is going to be like very health conscious and things like that and very kind of like, you know, anti-aging and maybe just kind of like longevity, things like that. Liquid death is kind of like I’m going after the rebellious culture. Yes. It has a component of being healthy at water and things like that, but like they’re going for the rebellious culture and those that like, enjoy that type of entertainment comedy. And ultimately it’s kind of like aspirational identity.

Josh Hadley 00:16:39  We’ll talk a little bit more about that. So to help you define who your primary customer is and answer the following questions. Number one, who do we want? Who do we most want to matter to? Number two, what life stage are they in? Number three what problem are they actively solving or what are they looking for? Number four what frustrates them about the current solutions on the market or not on the market today? Number five, what do they want to feel. That’s that aspirational identity. Number six what kind of person are they trying to become? Number seven who do they already trust? Who are like the associations, the brands or the people or the influencers or the media that they trust? And the number eight. What would make them proud to recommend your products. Okay. What would that be? The more precisely that you define the customer, the easier every other brand decision is going to become. So now that we’ve done that, let’s move into step number two. You’ve defined your primary customer.

Josh Hadley 00:17:40  Now you need to choose the outcome that you want to own for that customer. Okay. Customers do not fundamentally just want products. There’s always an underlying reason as to why they chose your product over somebody else. Okay. In primarily, every human is the same. We have these aspirational identities within us, and we’re always trying to seek for kind of who we are and expressing ourselves. So they the customers want to progress in that aspirational identity. The product is the vehicle. The outcome is the reason they care and products can be copied. But the outcome that you become known for is far harder to replicate. Does that make sense? Like to understand the difference between products are very easy for somebody to copy, but the purpose that they serve and the outcome that you’re trying to express to the customer when they buy your product, that’s much harder for anybody else to replicate. Okay. It’s the same thing with Red bull when you buy a Red bull. Okay. And I’ve got four examples that I’m going to walk you through, but specifically with Red bull.

Josh Hadley 00:18:45  When you drink it, you feel like you’re part of the adventurous or extreme sports lifestyle, if you will. Right. That’s part of your identity. Whereas if you’re going to go get some other random energy drink, it doesn’t have that kind of like association. So you may be drinking the Red bull because like you give off the appearance of like, hey, I’m outdoor adventurous, like extreme sports enthusiast. Right. Whereas somebody, you know, drinking a different energy drink may give off a different connotation. So let’s talk about how this works for the three brands we’ve already talked about. So AG one. Okay. Their product is a greens powder okay. In the outcome that they are trying to own is this you get confidence that you’re supporting your health through one simple daily habit without managing ten different random pills. Because I think we’ve all heard the different, like, podcast episodes and like, oh, you got to be on this supplement and that supplement, that supplement again, saying, like, we’re going to help you like, support your health with just like one simple daily habit.

Josh Hadley 00:19:45  That’s their message. That’s what they’re trying to deliver. Okay. Boom. Beauty. Their product is just cosmetics. Okay. The outcome that they’re trying to help their customers achieve is feeling attractive and visible as an older woman, without pretending to be younger. Pure and simple. Liquid death as an example. What’s their product? Water. The most commoditized product that you could possibly think of. Yet an incredible example of branding here. So what’s the outcome that they are trying to deliver through water? Hydration that feels entertaining, expressive, and culturally relevant? Okay. You’re trying to be kind of like your. It’s a little bit of a rebellious culture, but you’re trying to be seen as cool or hip or, you know, comes in the, like a beer can. That’s what it appears to be. And so it’s kind of this rebellious culture, fascinating story of branding. So that’s what it is. The outcome is how do I how am I perceived? Because just grabbing my Dasani water bottle, I’m not cool enough.

Josh Hadley 00:20:42  I need a liquid death to feel cool. So if you notice, every single one of these is serving a very specific outcome and purpose that that customer is trying to like, exemplify. So let’s dive into this the outcome hierarchy. A single product can create several levels of outcome simultaneously, but the most durable brands operate at all four different levels here, not just the functional ones. So here’s how AG one climbs the different hierarchy. Okay, social. Other people are recognizing that I use AG one and I take my wellness seriously. So if you maybe bring AG one with you to the to the gym, it’s seen as like, see, I am healthy. See, I am taking care of myself. It can be seen as a, you know, hey, I’m socially in the culture. Number two, it’s identity. I’m someone who prioritizes my health and I take it seriously emotionally. I’m confident that I’m that I’m genuinely taking care of my health. And functionally it delivers essential nutrients. And arguably you need to say like, I feel better by doing that.

Josh Hadley 00:21:41  Okay, so there’s social, there’s the identity, there’s emotional, and then there’s functional aspects. So if your product can serve all four of those, you’ve hit the nail on the head. But here’s what I would argue is the most important kind of like value that you need to be hitting upon and serving with any of your messaging and who you’re like, the outcome that you’re choosing to serve. Ultimately, it comes down to aspirational identity. That is what all of us as humans are craving, and that’s what the best brands are able to capitalize on people by products because they want to move closer to a specific identity. Right. Patagonia. What’s their identity? I’m environmentally responsible, and it also comes at a premium price. Okay, Rolex. I’m successful. So Rolex doesn’t matter how little the cost of the product actually might be. But I’m going to charge a premium because now it’s it’s a very exclusive club that could even afford a Rolex. So now you’re going to be perceived as a very successful individual.

Josh Hadley 00:22:41  And then Apple. Well, originally Apple was created as a like the outcome was for somebody that was creative to be able to express themself. Right. And a machine that actually serves people that are using the computer for creative purposes. That’s who Apple was originally designed for. And so aspirational identity is everything. It’s much deeper than, hey, I just like this product. So work into your process and your planning for your primary customer and the outcome that you’re giving your products are giving them into what is the aspirational identity we are helping these Customers achieve. When you unlock that in your mind, that’s where you’re going to begin to like actually start making progress. So step number three, now that you’ve unlocked the hey, here’s the customer, here’s the outcome. We’re trying to serve for them emotionally and aspirational. Now you got to choose the associations that you want to own in that customer’s mind. Okay. A brand is built by repeatedly connecting your company to just a small number of desirable ideas. So choose 3 to 5, like actual words or phrases that you want people to like associate to your brand.

Josh Hadley 00:23:48  So as an example, with age one, it’s daily simple habit okay, foundational nutrition. It’s discipline and performance and premium quality for liquid death. It’s rebellion and comedy. It’s entertainment and music. It’s sustainability without preaching. And it’s anti boring for Patagonia. It’s environmental responsibility. It’s outdoor credibility. It’s buy less but buy better. And it’s all about activism. With boom beauty. It’s pro age beauty. That’s their phrase. It’s confidence in simplicity. It’s mature women that are visible and it’s natural appearance. So notice, like every single one of these brands has come to the conclusion of like these are the associations. These like if we were to go ask a customer like what do you think about our brand? Who are we? What are the words or phrases that come to your mind? We want you to say like with with liquid death. They want you to say like, I’m a little rebellious. They want you to say like, I love the entertainment factor. It cracks me up. I love the the cans and the funny sayings on the cans.

Josh Hadley 00:24:55  Like that’s what they want you to say. So identify what are the things you actually want customers to say. So here’s the best kind of like process and exercise to help you identify maybe what some of those messages are. Complete this sentence for your brand. Then honestly assess the distance between the intent and the reality. Your gap is that your brand building works. So here’s the phrase. When customers hear our name, we want them to immediately think of blank, blank and blank. That’s it. Okay, then ask what are customers likely likely thinking today? So think through wherever you’re at in business today. What do you think customers are doing? And here’s a better option. If you actually have customers, ask them. And then it’s going to be very revealing for you to actually understand, oh, this is what people perceive. And here’s the important example like example as to like why you want to go through this exercise. Take for example two different coffee brands. You can have a very different associations while selling the exact same product.

Josh Hadley 00:25:54  Okay. So coffee brand A may want their customers to talk about speed, convenience, energy affordability. But coffee brand B might be hey, I want them to think of this as like a craft. It’s ritual. It’s origin, taste, community. You can tell like those are two very different vibes and it’s going to navigate. It’s going to gravitate towards very specific customers that want to aspire to those identities. So again, the identity is very much a keen to the associations that you want to deliberately build with your products. So now let’s move into step number four. Now you now that you know the associations you want to be known for now, right. The brand promise okay, so combine your customer, the outcome, the approach into one clear internal statement. This is going to be a decision making tool for you, not just a tagline okay. This is a promise that will help you answer. Should we launch this product? Should we partner with this creator? Should we run this ad campaign? So here’s the formula.

Josh Hadley 00:26:54  And again you can fill in the blank here. The formula is this. We help fill in the blank specific customer achieve fill in the blank a specific outcome through fill in the blank a distinct approach. So that’s the phrase. That’s the formula. Again, if you’re just listening to this make sure you come check it out on YouTube. I’m showing the slides showing you the exact formula in the sayings here. But let’s go through three different examples here because I think the examples help this resonate so much better. So number one, Aegon, we help health conscious adults support their nutritional foundation through one simple daily habit. So notice now we’re combining those associations. We’re combining that customer avatar the outcome into one simple statement with boom beauty. We help mature women feel confident and enhance their natural beauty through simple pro age products. Okay, last but not least, let’s talk about my own brand. We help intentional parents raise confident and capable children through cute screen free learning tools. That’s what we’re doing. That’s our brand promise.

Josh Hadley 00:28:02  So step number five. Now we’ve defined kind of what a brand the brand is. now. You need to be ruthless with what the brand is not okay. Brands become clear through exclusion. Saying yes builds revenue. Saying no builds meaning every off branded yes makes the company harder to understand and erodes all of the associations that you’ve been trying to build. Let’s talk about a few examples here with boom beauty boom is not anti-aging language. In fact, they’re adopting like, no, we’re pro age. We want you to talk about, you know, getting older. It’s okay. It’s not teen beauty. It’s not complex routines. It’s also not shame based marketing. Liquid death is not calm spa water. It’s not safe corporate wellness. It’s not soft nature imagery that you would get through like Fiji water, etc. and it’s not serious sustainability lectures. Okay, AG one is not a cheap multivitamin pill. It’s not a bodybuilding supplement. It’s not a cabinet full of pills. It’s not a constantly changing flavor company.

Josh Hadley 00:29:08  It is one tried and true thing. So again, now the most important thing is like define what you are not. So let’s move into phase number two. Now that we’re in phase number two, it’s all about how we express the brand. We did all the hard work of defining who we are, the associations that we want to develop and who we’re not. But now we need to express that. We need to convey this message to our customers. So this section is all about how we translate that brand meaning into the product, our identity, the visual world and the customer experience. So step number six on our journey here, we now need to choose what our hero product is. And you’re probably wondering like why is this like part of the expression like why am I choosing your hero product? Your hero product is actually fundamental to you becoming known for something and actually becoming a brand. Okay, with age one, they were originally first known for just one kind of green powder supplement brand. That was it.

Josh Hadley 00:30:06  Now they have since expanded that. But the same thing is true with Liquid Death. They just came out with kind of a beer can looking design with water in it. That was it. They have since expanded with Yeti. It was the original cooler that was like what they were known for, and that’s what they created their brand around. And it has since expanded. Last but not least, you have the Aura ring and you can hear it like the brand is actually aura. But like you keep saying aura ring because like that’s what they’re known for is the ring. It’s one recognizable product that’s established truly like the brand’s identity. So choose your hero product. Your hero product teaches the customer what the company means. Do not ask 50 unrelated products to build the brand simultaneously. The catalog can be brand could be broad, but the entry point needs to be very clear. So your most e-commerce brands are going to be built around one recognizable product or product system, and your your hero product actually teaches your customer what the brand is all about.

Josh Hadley 00:31:08  So here’s what it takes to become like a hero product. And it’s not just sales. I think that many of us that have sold on Amazon, we’re all like, oh, how many hero SKUs do you have? Like, that’s the wrong way to look at this. And because you’re looking at it from just a sales perspective, oh, this is my best seller. And it’s like that might be your best seller, but is that your best foot forward? Does this product actually represent and teach the consumer who you are as a brand? So here is kind of the five like different frameworks that you should use to establish, like whether something is actually your hero product for your brand representing it or not. So number one, it needs to solve an obvious problem. Okay. The need is clear to the customer before they even explain it. Number two, does this product produce a visible outcome where the results can be seen, felt or Demonstrated. Number three. Is it easy to explain and demonstrate? Okay.

Josh Hadley 00:32:04  Does this work across organic and paid content formats? Step number four. Okay. Does this lead naturally to another purchase? Does it set up the customer journey, or does it just try to solve it all in one fell swoop? And last but not least, number five. Does this actually represent the intended brand? Every element of the product reinforces what the brand means. So ask yourself those questions before you hit your wagon to one of your specific hero SKUs. Just because it’s the best seller on Amazon or any other marketplace. If you actually want to build a brand that I think is the best value that you could put together, if you want to actually succeed over the next decade, then think through what your hero product is going to be. Now let’s move into step number seven. Make the product remarkable. You’ve identified what your hero product is. Now you need to make sure that if this is going to be your hero skew, it has to come with all of the bells and whistles. Because ultimately, what are you trying to do with this hero product? You are trying to establish trust before we can even talk about branding and what that actually means.

Josh Hadley 00:33:05  You need to have like an immense level of trust. So when a customer gets the product, they’re like, wow, this company really thought of everything. Like, man, these guys, I like their messaging. I like that they included things I didn’t even think I needed in this product. Like, I could tell they actually know what they’re doing. So branding can drive the first purchase, but the product experience earns the second purchase. An average product with excellent advertising may create sales, but it will not create durable trust. It is so much better to spend more time in the product development getting the product right, because if you do it right, the word of mouth will spread that product faster than any paid marketing will, and it lowers your customer acquisition costs. So it’s a win win across the board. So ask better research questions. Number one, what would make this an obvious best in the category number two. What would make you recommend it? Without it? Without being asked what would make the customer love it so much that they’re telling all their friends about it? Number three, what frustrated you about using some of your competitor’s products? Number four, what would you miss if it disappeared in this product? And number five, what would it what would make it worth paying more for for that product? So if you can answer those questions, those are going to help make your products more remarkable.

Josh Hadley 00:34:25  Now step number eight. Now that we’ve got a good product that sits behind us, we’ve got a hero skew. We’ve got something that is an exceptional product a really good first experience for the customer. Now we need to create a recognizable brand identity. Okay a brand needs a recognizable source of personality. This is going to define who the brand is. Before there’s any type of like outside validation. And there’s really like three primary different like models of a recognizable brand identity. And there’s combinations of all three of these as well. But let’s talk about this model. A this is like a founder led identity okay. The founder embodies the brand, values its best for beauty, parenting, coaching, education, mission driven categories where a personal like trust actually matters. So some of the examples from this are like boom beauty. This was originally founded by Cindy Joseph. She has since passed away and they rebranded. But this was originally like founder led. You have Spanx with Sarah Blakely, you have Magnolia which was Chip and Joanna Gaines.

Josh Hadley 00:35:28  Model B is having a brand character. So the brand itself acts like a recognizable person or character. This is best for commodity type products or younger audiences and entertainment driven categories. So liquid death, what’s their branded character? It’s a skull. They don’t have a recognizable voice or founder lead, you know, visible person. It’s the skull. It’s a character that represents their brand. Duolingo is the owl, and I think we all know Geico with the Gecko and Model C is having a design LED identity. So this identity comes from restraint materials, sensory experience. This is going to be best for for premium products. So premium fashion technology or design oriented categories. So good examples of this are going to be like Apple Tiffany you all recognize like the jewelry box with the Tiffany blue is an actual color right. And so that is creating a recognizable brand identity. So choose one of these models. Maybe some of them like maybe you merge some of these two together. For us we are very founder led and design lead.

Josh Hadley 00:36:36  And so it’s a combination of those two where even if you were to take away our brand name, you would still be able to tell just from the product design alone who our branding is. That is just as important. Way too many people are just like going to into ChatGPT or they’re going to AI and they’re like, hey, design this product for me. And guess what? If you do that, design becomes basically worthless for you and your brand because you’re like the rest of everything. And I think many of you listening to this, do you not notice how like so much more marketing materials are just being AI generated? And it’s all starting to look fairly similar in the brands that are willing to, like, be a little bit more creative and actually have a human sit behind it, are starting to stand out like a sore thumb in a really good way. And so just know that there’s like three primary ways that you can kind of come off and appear to create a visual identity for your product.

Josh Hadley 00:37:27  That becomes fundamental to growing a brand. Now that you’ve identified what brand identity you want to kind of emulate, now you actually need to define the personality traits. So this is similar to the associations that we talked about but different at the same time. So you only want to choose 3 to 5 personality traits that define how the brand speaks, how it behaves, how it appears. Okay. Weak traits, as an example, are going to define things that are very like broad okay. Strong traits are very specific that actually guide your creative decisions. So let’s talk about what are some weak traits. If you were just to be like, oh, here’s the personality traits of my brand. We’re friendly, we’re innovative, we’re professional, high quality or we’re customer focused. It’s kind of broad. It’s somewhat nebulous. Let’s talk about what are some strong traits. We’re irreverent, we’re defiant. We’re unapologetic. We’re reassuring. We’re maternal. We are calm or we are precise, sophisticated, restrained or adventurous. Playful, rugged, direct.

Josh Hadley 00:38:29  Okay, so define what is the brand? Believe. What does it stand against? What does it find funny? What does it never say? So those are like some of like the four questions you can ask yourself to help identify the personality traits. So again, I’ll reiterate those four questions to help you define the personality traits. What is the brand believe? What does it stand against? What does it find funny and what does it never say? Now, once you’ve answered all of those questions and you’ve actually established a personality and identity for your brand, now we can move to step number nine. This is to build a distinctive visual and verbal world. Okay, so design makes the brand meaning easier to recognize. It cannot replace the meaning the recognition test. Remove the logo from an ad from a package. A social post with the customer. Still recognize the brand. That is the question you need to ask yourself. No matter what you decided to identify yourself with for your brand. I think listening to this, if you saw a light blue or a Tiffany blue jewelry box, would you know that that came from Tiffany? Yeah, most likely if it was Tiffany blue, right.

Josh Hadley 00:39:34  And with even out having to have the brand Tiffany on there, you would know where that came from. Okay. Liquid death, let’s cover up the the skull on the can and let’s cover up the brand name Liquid Death. Would people still recognize it? Yeah, you know it. Of course they would. Okay with boom beauty. If you were to cover up the actual brand name, would you be able to tell from not only the products, but specifically like their social posts, their website? Would you be able to say like, oh yeah, that’s that’s boom beauty. Like, I know these people that they are kind of like relating to. So building a distinctive visual and verbal world is extremely important. Okay. That’s where a lot of people are going to get into, hey, here is my brand style guide. It comes down to the typography that you choose. It talks about like here’s our logo, right. Defining your logo. Those are all the things that come into a brand style guide.

Josh Hadley 00:40:26  So make sure you work in kind of steps eight and nine. Build upon each other of what your identity and then what your visual verbal world that you are creating and crafting. So that’s where the style guide comes from. Step number ten audit the current customer experience. Okay. Every single customer encounter either reinforces or it’s going to contradict your brand promise. So audit all of them. Here are five different areas that you should like. Seriously consider auditing and thinking through. What am I actually conveying in these different like customer touchpoints? So number one, your product and packaging that’s fairly obvious. But like think through that deliberately. There’s a reason why Apple designed their package the way that it is. There’s a reason why Tiffany created the package that they did. There’s a reason why liquid death created the why it’s in a can and not a plastic bottle. There’s a reason behind it all. Then next, what’s your digital presence saying about you? That’s your that’s your website. That’s your Amazon listings. That’s your social media.

Josh Hadley 00:41:29  That’s your advertising. So this goes really deep. But like what does that look like. Is there cohesion or are you saying something on Amazon that you know contradicts what you’re trying to say on your website or what it says on your product packaging. Okay. Next. Think about like the content that you’re putting out into the world and the creators. Okay. Maybe affiliates or those that are kind of representing your brand. What are they saying? What are your emails look like? What are your SMS messages look like? If you have creators, what are they saying about your product next? Audit your customer experience. Okay. What audit what you are saying in your customer service. Okay. There should be always like a tagline or how do we come off to customers? Are we warm and bubbly or friendly or is this very transactional? Okay, what do we do with shipping or returns? What’s our language that we’re using there? And then last but not least, if you’re in retail stores, what your retail presence look like and what message are you conveying there? What’s that interaction feel like for the customer? So here are some examples as we dive into you know, we’ve talked about AG one.

Josh Hadley 00:42:36  We’ve talked about boom beauty. We’ve talked about liquid death. I want to share with you very specific examples of how it all different, like customer journey touchpoints, they are relaying the same message over and over and over and over again, whether it’s on Amazon or their website or in their emails or their SMS campaigns or their YouTube videos or the actual product, or if you see their product on retail store shelves, you will see the same message repeated over and over again. Okay, so here you can see like their AG one unboxing kit okay. Build a better day Foundation. Foundational nutrition is how better days are built. And it talks more about like, hey, you don’t need to have multiple pills. You’re going to get one simple habit. Make your life easier. Okay. Boom beauty. Look at what’s on the very front of their website here. Beauty that gets better with age. It’s all about this pro age message that they’re trying to convey to the world. Okay. If you take a look at here’s just three social media screenshots that I grabbed.

Josh Hadley 00:43:35  Okay, with Boom Beauty. Here’s what they’re saying. Hey. Public apology. We had no idea how our products would replace drawers of unused anti-aging stuff to boost confidence levels and make mature women feel like themselves. Again, our mistake, but not really. And so it’s like, here’s this official pro age apology statement. Okay. With age one, it’s, you know, celebrate the 4th of July with a free AG one travel kit. But here’s what they say. One scoop once a day. That’s it. You’re going to see that message repeated over and over and over again. One scoop once a day. That’s it. With liquid death, it’s take a look at it like they’re very kind of like rebellious, kind of crude humor. And you can see, you know, murder your thirst. That’s their kind of like saying their tagline. Everything kind of comes back to that irreverent, kind of outlandish comedy, Murder Your Thirst when it comes to their ads that they’re running. So these are screenshots of ag ones, actual ads.

Josh Hadley 00:44:28  And I’m showing you this to say, like between their emails, between their social media posts, between the ads that they actually run. It is all very congruent. They are all saying the same thing, trying to target the same customer. Same aspirational identity. So take a look at some of these. Right. I don’t have to I don’t have a supplement stack. I have a G one. Let’s go. The next add a G one is the daily health drink that fills nutrition gaps so you never miss a moment. Okay, goes back to that one simple habit one scoop once a day. That’s it. And then the last ad that you see here, a G one delivers advanced muscle and gut support built on the foundation of AG one. Okay, stronger mornings start here again. It’s just kind of like redefining, hey, it’s one daily simple habit and you can see like it’s a very cohesive message. Are there different angles that they’re coming after this? Yeah. And that’s what I wanted to show you is but it’s like goes back to one theoretical principle which they’ve defined, which is, hey, somebody who is health conscious that does not want ten complicated supplement stacks and just wants one simple, easy daily habit.

Josh Hadley 00:45:35  That’s that. All of their ads are targeting that with different hooks, different angles because there’s different pain points, customer avatars. And that’s what all of these are serving. So again, yes, you can go after different audiences and different segments of the market, but you should be serving one cohesive message and outcome that you’re delivering. Now. Last but not least, check out their YouTube content as well. So if you go to AG one you look at their YouTube content. What do they have? It’s Andrew Huberman talking about simplifying your supplements. Again, it goes back to this message of, hey, our one thing, our outcome is you don’t have to have a supplement stack. It’s one daily habit, okay. Liquid death, they have an irrelevant, you know, don’t eff the planet with Cherie Deville, okay? And you can see it’s just kind of this irreverent, like, humor. And then with boom Beauty, you have a creator who is an older, mature woman. She’s not a recognizable celebrity, and it’s called Sherry’s Boom son testimonial.

Josh Hadley 00:46:33  That’s what they’re trying to get out to the market. So you can see all of these people, all of these brands have ads, they have YouTube content. But all of the content across the entire customer touchpoint in journey is all cohesive. That’s the important thing. That’s why you need to audit every single touchpoint that your customer has, because you are either building your brand in that trust and the messaging, or you’re actually eroding it by making it confusing. Step number 11. You now want to reinforce your brand messaging through trusted associations. This is going to be the best way when it comes to like building brand in an actual association with your products. It comes down to these trusted associations. Now that the brand is knows who it is. You now need to deliberately pair it with people, organizations and communities that already represent those values. The people okay, meaning those that you’re going to associate with, do not define the brand. Rather, they’re going to validate it and they are going to amplify it.

Josh Hadley 00:47:34  The critical distinction is this you are borrowing their trust, not renting attention. This is the biggest mistake I see people make. They think that, hey, I just need to grow sales. So I need to go execute affiliate marketing. But affiliate marketing is nothing more than you building an association with trust. And so really, when somebody’s saying that, hey, they’re grasping, you know, if they’re saying I need to drum up more sales, they’re probably in a arbitrage business, whereas a brand owner is going to think, yes, I do need to execute affiliate marketing, but who I choose to work with is probably ten times more important. Who I say yes to as an affiliate versus who I say no to is fundamental to me building the brand. So let’s talk about some of these examples again. Who are the the associations that they’ve built with their product. Number one athlete’s number two health experts. Number three business leaders for performance focused like podcast hosts and then an authority network, reinforcing discipline and credibility from multiple sources with liquid death.

Josh Hadley 00:48:38  Who are their associations? Who are they trying to, like, associate with its musicians, its comedians, extreme sports personalities and culturally unexpected collaborations? And here’s what they’re not right. A white coat doctor wellness influencer could actually weaken their identity unless it was done out of like, a comedy skit type of fashion, right? And then last but not least, this is probably like the easiest example for everybody to relate to. But Nike, what are Nike’s associations or trusted associations? Michael Jordan, Serena Williams, LeBron James, elite athletes who embody what their personality of their brand or associations they want to be known for, which are winning greatness, discipline. So I hope that makes sense. Like, there’s a reason why we went through the exercise of what are the words you want to be known for? What’s the personality of your brand? Because now if you define the customer, you define who you are, what you are not. It’s going to make everything else so much easier. When it comes time to create some trusted associations with other people, organizations, or communities.

Josh Hadley 00:49:42  Now that’s a very nebulous and that’s a very broad topic. So I want to dive into. There are seven different borrowed trust models of how you can build these trusted associations. Okay, not all collabs are equal. Choose the model that matches your brand building goal, and always ask whether you’re buying reach or if you are actually borrowing genuine trust. That is the key. There’s you know, and at one point for me, I was always just like, oh, I just need reach. I need more reach, I need more eyeballs, I need more traffic. But now it is much more about how do I build or borrow genuine trust. Okay. We’re going to go through these seven different models. There are and we’ll dive into each of these in depth, but at a high level you have number one paid creator endorsement. These are going to be your simple like content creators. Number two, you have long term ambassadors. Number three, you have creator ownership or an equity partner. Number four, you have product collaborations.

Josh Hadley 00:50:40  Number five, you have expert partnerships. Number six, you have brand co-branding partnerships. And then number seven you have community or lifestyle associations. So let’s dive into each of these. And I’ve got examples for every single one of them. And I’m also going to argue that the process that I will walk you through or the sequence is they probably start with the easiest first. And the further we get is we get to kind of model number seven. These are going to become a lot more complicated and a little bit harder to pull off and a little bit more expensive and kind of complicated. So model number one this is paid endorsement okay. You’re going to borrow their audience a creator, promote your existing product usually in the short term. So when is this best for? Well, it’s best for if you’re just starting to build your brand. Become known for something you do need to generate sales. This is best for launching products, testing different creators, or messaging driving immediate revenue. So let’s talk about who like a very good example of this.

Josh Hadley 00:51:39  We all know goalie gummies and they went very heavy into TikTok shop. However, goalie gummies didn’t just like partner with one creator or one one influencer. They went after a million creators, a million influencers. In fact, it didn’t matter who you were, as long as you were just willing to play the game of sharing the product and posting about the product. So it was much more of just like paid creator endorsement. Okay, now here’s the challenge. Goalie was just kind of like spreading themselves thin amongst a lot of creators. Did they create a lot of awareness? Most certainly. They created a lot of awareness, by the way. They also lost a lot of money, if I might say they spent a lot of money, but they didn’t really establish themselves as a brand in particular, known for one thing because they went broad with a lot of different creators. So that is an avenue. But if you really want to build a brand and you want to capitalize on something, a much better version of this is, hey, I’m only going to partner with these creators that serve my specific customer avatar or are actually my exact customer avatar.

Josh Hadley 00:52:43  They might be the end user that I want to target, and that’s who I’m going to go after. That’s who I’m partnering with instead of a spray and pray approach. Right. And again, I think like an easy example is this if you’re selling feminine hygiene products, like you’re probably not going to go after a bunch of men and outdoor rugged outdoor enthusiasts to go promote those products, right? You’re probably keeping it to a very defined subset of creators so that they are speaking to the right audience from their own kind of borrowed trust of who they are. Let’s dive into model number two. This is the long term ambassador. This is somebody that you want them to almost like become part of the brand. So instead of just running a bunch of campaigns with a lot of different creators and they’re kind of like short term performance driven, you’re trying to create like a longer term partnership. This is something that’s going to last years. The person becomes repeatedly associated with the company over years, and eventually the customers connect the two together.

Josh Hadley 00:53:40  So the best example of this is truly like Michael Jordan and Nike. So if you haven’t watched the movie air, it is one of my favorite movies because it talks about like how Nike was like behind the eight ball and converse was like beating them even in basketball. And they went out on a massive limb to get Michael Jordan and Michael Jordan completely transform and flip the script for Nike. As Michael Jordan became more well known as the Goat, so to speak. And then customers started associating. Now Michael Jordan’s greatness with Nike and Nike was about success and greatness and winning. And then they created their own kind of Air Jordan line. This created its own subbrand. Right. And this became like one of the best partnerships that really flipped the script for Nike. Model number three creator, ownership and equity partner. So the creator does not merely get paid to promote the product, right? With the athletic example right. It’s Under Armour Steph Curry I know that that has since expired. But like that’s why those big companies do those branding deals is because they’re trying to associate themselves with an athlete or whoever they think is great or emulates their values over the period of years.

Josh Hadley 00:54:49  Whereas the difference with a creator, ownership or equity partner is they actually receive ownership, profit, participation, or meaningful long term upside in exchange for helping build the company. Okay. So let’s talk a little bit more about this. There’s a couple really good examples right now Logan Paul and KSI with Prime. So most people especially like my son 11 years old like he associates Prime with Logan Paul like, oh that’s that’s Logan Paul’s drink and so prime like actually there’s like a separate brand. It’s Congo brands provides much of the product development, operations and distribution infrastructure, while Logan Paul and KSI bring the audience cultural relevance, content launches and ongoing public association. And guess what? They each have equity stake. I want to say it’s like 20% or above each of them. So like this is a significant investment for sure. But another good example here is MrBeast and festivals, right? MrBeast didn’t just like partner with the snack brand. He actually co-founded one. MrBeast wasn’t just about like, hey, yeah, can I just go make a quick buck by giving somebody else with a chocolate bar a shout out on my YouTube channel? He could have made some sweet cash with that, but he he said, no, I want to actually co-create and co-found one right now.

Josh Hadley 00:56:02  It’s a company he owns equity in makes him a principal, not just a promoter. And what’s interesting about Mister Beast and Festivals here is like he’s actually the majority owner in here now. He actually partnered with Jim Murray. He’s the former BAA president. So again, it’s more of this like collaboration. But looking at like creators, sometimes they can own the majority of the company. So really good examples on that front. Model number four product collaboration. This is where you actually build something together. So this is how the creator helps design and build the product. Then the customers buy it because they trust both brands. So examples of this Nike and Travis Scott Travis Scott was able to help like design his own shoe and then Nike’s able to go market that you have Crocs and Post Malone, right? They again came together to collab on a very specific product, and now it’s the hey, this is the croc. Like, go get the Crocs, buy Post Malone, go get the Nike’s that were designed by Travis Scott.

Josh Hadley 00:57:02  So again, it’s going to increase sales and again increase associations with whoever you decide to collab with. And at that same token, there’s probably a revenue share or a profit share for that specific product, not for the entire company, but for that specific product. Model number five. Expert partnership. This is about borrowing credibility instead of just like borrowing fame. It’s borrowing expertise. So here’s really good examples. AG one in Andrew Huberman Colgate and Dennis Crest and the American Dental Association. So they were going off of hey these are perceived as experts or very credible institutions like dentists or the American Dental Association. We’re going to go get their stamp of approval or buy in or partnership on our product so that, you know, customers will trust us even more. See how we keep returning back to this thing of branding, which just boils down to trust. At the end of the day, that’s the whole reason why crest is going to go partner with the Ada, the American Dental Association, which again, if you go look at your toothpaste tube, you’ve probably wondered, like, hey, approved by the Ada.

Josh Hadley 00:58:10  And you’re like, okay, great. Like, I just assumed it would be. But if you actually look at it, they’re the only brand that says that. Right? And so that’s an important factor. And that’s something that they claim in their advertisements on TV, something that they print on the actual product itself. It’s also printed on the actual packaging. So while you’re in the retail store looking at it, it’s something listed in there. Amazon copy, all of the above. You can notice, like they’re trying to capitalize on this borrowed trust of another institution. Or it could be an authority figure like Andrew Huberman with AG one model number six brand and co-branding partnership. So borrow another brand’s equity. So we talked about borrowing another like creator or influencer that was like Travis Scott and Nike or Post Malone and Crocs. Now it’s like if we merge two different brands together. So GoPro and Red bull, Lego and Star Wars, Star Wars, Apple and Hermes. Okay, so the the co-branding in practice GoPro owns capturing adventure.

Josh Hadley 00:59:13  Red bull owns creating adventure. Together they create content neither brand could produce alone. And both brands become stronger because the partnership feels authentic. So it’s like you’re borrowing trust from GoPro and you’re borrowing trust from Red bull. And the two are able to like, really like even further, the trust together create more exciting partnerships in deals. Last but not least, model number seven. This is community and lifestyle association. So the brand becomes connected to a movement customers buy because they identify with that culture. So again these are two really good examples. You have liquid death. And with the heavy metal, heavy metal and the punk culture okay. Liquid Death isn’t partnering with just one person. It’s partnering with an entire identity or community or lifestyle. It’s skateboarding, UFC, extreme sport, Red bull. It’s the same thing. Red bull doesn’t just sponsor athletes, it sponsors extreme sports, formula one, cliff diving, air races, snowboarding, BMX, surfing, etc. so like no other like lifestyle and community can become a really big like.

Josh Hadley 01:00:17  That’s why Red bull goes and sponsors these like community events. And it’s the same thing with Liquid Death. Why they go sponsor brand like heavy metal bands and things like that. So just know that you can. It’s not just thinking about a creator or a content creator on TikTok or Instagram, like there’s so many different ways to borrow, trust, and gain association from other established organizations. Here’s the most important thing. And we walk through seven different models. All of them vary in their complexity, as you can see, but here’s why. Premium creators, those more difficult ones where it is maybe a celebrity, or it is a very recognizable brand, or it’s a very recognizable kind of community or lifestyle or sport. Here’s why they work. People and brands protect their own reputation, and so they are risking years of trust with their brand to kind of go brand or to work with you. And so that’s why the association transfers, that’s the reason why you want to do partnerships or work with affiliates and work with very specific affiliates, because you want their trust that they have gained over time to then be borrowed back to you and to say, hey, yeah, you should trust this brand because I’ve built my brand, my personal brand, or maybe my actual brand over the course of decades.

Josh Hadley 01:01:36  You get to borrow that. So this is how you pour gasoline on the fire. And arguably, I would say this is going to be your best way to actually emulate and kind of tell the world who you are is through these borrowed associations. So can you do all seven of these? No. And not one brand does all seven of those. But what you can see is just like, here’s very different models and things you should think through. What I would recommend is start with one and then try to move to another one that is a little bit more complicated. The further you move into like kind of these premium brands or premium creators, the more of that association or that trust that you’re looking to build will get built through those relationships. Remember, you’re playing the long game. You’re not just in it for the quick, you know, turn on cash, you’re in it for the long game and the association and the trust that will transfer. Let’s move into phase three. This is the final phase of our brand building efforts.

Josh Hadley 01:02:29  We’ve already talked about who we are, who we’re not. We’ve talked about ways that we’re going to magnify or exemplify our brand and share it with the world. Now it’s all about in phase three, compounding the brand. Brand equity compounds when consistent meaning is repeated over time. This is how it changes how customers behave, not just how they feel in the moment. So let’s talk about this step number 12 of our 16 step system. Here we’re going to repeat the same meaning consistently. Brands are built through consistent Repetition. And guess what? You’re going to be really tired of hearing the same message over and over and over again. But here’s what is going to happen inside the company. Repetition feels boring, and it’s like, hey, I think we’ve said this enough, right? Customers understand this, right? But the opposite is true. Outside the company. Outside the company. Repetition increases the memory. The campaigns change, but the the meaning remains recognizable. Okay, so brand building is not just saying it once, or it’s not just slapping the label on your product, it’s actually saying the same thing.

Josh Hadley 01:03:31  The important thing hundreds and hundreds of recognizable ways. Okay, so what’s going to stay consistent? It’s your primary customer. It’s the outcome and the promise. It’s the associations. It’s the personality. It’s the identity and the voice that you’ve identified for your brand. But what can evolve like your campaign concepts, your hooks for your ads, the content formats and the platforms that you’re using to magnify your voice and get your message out into the world? Creator partnerships can evolve, seasonal applications can evolve, product stories, and new launches can evolve. But you need to build a content system that is around certain pillars. So we talked about these, but with age one it’s a daily routine. It’s one scoop, one habit, one simple habit per day. Boom. Beauty is all about pro age beauty, natural skin and aging. Real women, real stories. Liquid liquid Death is about rebellion and humor, anti-corporate attitude, extreme sports and music culture. So go look at their content and make sure you have a content system that is repeating the same narrative over and over and over again and again.

Josh Hadley 01:04:36  Here are those same examples that I shared with you that are social media posts from all three of those brands, and then you can see their YouTube content strategy is again magnifying the exact same content and message over and over and over again. That is part of building a brand. It is your content. It is the things that you say and speak out into the world. But you need to have one consistent message. If you do not have one consistent message, you’re going to confuse everybody and you’re eroding your brand trust every single day. Step number 13 build the next purchase into the brand. The strongest evidence of a brand and it’s trust is not the first purchase. It’s actually the second purchase. A valuable brand creates a customer base that is willing to try what the company launches next. So here’s what you need to do. You actually need to map out your customer journey before you even need it, because you need to be able to architect the customer journey to say, hey here, I know customer, this is your aspirational identity.

Josh Hadley 01:05:36  This is the outcome you are trying to achieve. Product number one is going to, you know, help you along that journey. It’s going to be step number one. But then I know you’re going to then you know product one is going to solve this pain point. But then I know it’s going to lead to another pain point that you’re going to have. And lo and behold, I have the solution to that next pain point. That’s product number two. And then on that journey, as you continue to progress, you’re going to experience another challenge and you’re going to have another pain point. So here is product number three. And that’s ultimately what you’re trying to do is what’s your entry point. That’s your hero product that we talked about. This exemplifies your brand all in one. It’s demonstrable. You can easily see it. It solves an immediate need. But the second purchase is a logical complement or a replenishment that reinforces that habit. Then you’ve got cross category products. These are adjacent products that the customer trusts.

Josh Hadley 01:06:29  Number four, you have subscription or upgrade products. And then five, you have kind of like referrals and gifts. But here’s the important thing. Product journey by business type. If you look at AG one what was their hero product? It was their AG one daily greens powder. Then they introduced travel packs. So now it’s hey, here’s a different format, same product but different formats, so you can take it with you on the go. Then they came out with AG one protein and then they came out with additional subscription bundles. But it all came within like a complete daily nutrition promise. With Boom Beauty, it started with the Boomstick trio. Okay. It was color glo moisturized all in one. Okay, then it turned into skincare. Then it turned into hair care products. And then it leads to different tools or applications that you can use. Okay. But it’s all anchored around pro age kind of woman identity and serving that customers needs in their entire journey. Liquid death is started with just still water.

Josh Hadley 01:07:28  Okay. And it was the tallboy can similar to the a beer can. Then it turned into sparkling water. Then it turned into flavored sparkling waters with, you know, mango chainsaw. And they’re kind of funny names that they gave off to that. And now it’s with iced teas. So you can see it’s like, hey, if you liked our water now, you might like sparkling water. Now, if you like that, you might like our flavored sparkling water and iced teas, etc. they’re just trying to serve that next customer pain point because they know, hey, now I feel cool drinking water, but I’m going to get tired with water. But I still want something that’s as healthy as water. So here’s flavored water with very few calories. Like they’re still serving the same customer avatar, but in a very unique manner. Step number 14 align every single customer touchpoint. This goes back to auditing every customer touchpoint, but make sure that every customer interaction is either going to reinforce or it’s going to contradict the brand promise.

Josh Hadley 01:08:23  Okay, the brand is the total experience, not just one ad campaign, not just one product. So if you’re trying to create like a premium brand, like look at yourself and ask these questions, do you have premium advertising? Is that what you’re trying to advertise as premium? But then when the customer gets the package in the mail, it’s cheap packaging, okay, the experience contradicts the positioning at the moment of truth. Do you have a simplicity promise but a confusing setup. So if AG one had, it’s like, hey, one simple daily habit. But then it’s like, well, step number one, you need a, you know, you need to sift our, our greens and then you need to include a couple tablespoons of vinegar. And then I need you to go get apple cider vinegar. Mix that in. And then it’s like three cups of water. And it’s like it’s already too much. Right. And so again confusing setup sustainability claims. But then you have excessive plastic. So these are just like some of the nuances that like if you’re having a brand make sure that it’s cohesive throughout.

Josh Hadley 01:09:22  The same thing. If you’re all about sustainability, carry it throughout the entire brand. If you’re all about simplicity and easiness, then make sure everything including the product, the box, the setup, the customer communication everything is easy and simple because you’re trying to do everything and you’re either going to compound that message and reinforce it, or you’re going to contradict it. So create that full customer touchpoint map. So truly like the the step here to make sure this is a compounding flywheel for your brand is to make sure you go through like the entire customer journey, which from my experience, like there’s 14 different like levels to this customer touchpoint. So number one, it’s discovery. How do they even find you to begin with. What’s the messaging that they’re hearing there. Number two what’s their first impression when they see that first interaction whatever that is. What are the words that come to their mind? Number three, when they’re going through their their evaluation, whether they’re considering your product or the competitors, what’s going on in their mind and what are they comparing and why? Number four, when they make that purchase, what does that look like? Okay.

Josh Hadley 01:10:24  What does that look like in the transaction email that they get from your website? Because that’s going to be your best way to magnify who you are as a brand. Number five, while they’re waiting for the product to be delivered, what does that experience look like? Number six what is the unboxing or the packaging experience look like? Number seven what is their first use of their product look like? What are they saying about it? What’s their feelings? How do they feel? Number eight. Okay. Ongoing use. Hopefully they’re continuing to use your product. And what does that look like over time? What are their feelings. How are they using it? How are they carrying it? Okay. Nine what about if they run into support issues and the product stops working like it? They thought it should, or they’re confused about the product or something like that. What is your customer support system look like? Is that a good experience a negative experience? Is it cut and dry? Is it flavorful and exciting and bubbly and warm? Or is it, you know, cut and dry? Like I said, what are they saying in their reviews of their product? Next, what level of retention is there? Do they come back and do they buy more products? Why do they want to continue opening up your emails or your SMS campaigns? Or why do they want to keep following your Facebook page or Instagram page? What’s your reasoning for having any sort of retention for them to stick around 12.

Josh Hadley 01:11:44  What’s a reason to give you a referral? Do you have incentives in place? Do you actually have a referral program or do you not? Number 13. Do you have a community? So one of my favorite ones is like tonal has done a great job with this. Tonal is like the workout machine. You could just like plug in against your wall, do a whole bunch of workouts. They actually have a thriving Facebook community that sharing like, hey, here are here the best ways I’m using the product. There’s also, I can’t remember, there’s a sous vide company that does a really good job with this. That’s all about having a Facebook community, and they’re all sharing recipes and things like that. So what level of community is there or is there not for your product in brand, and what messages and experience are people seeing and experiencing there? And then from there, 14 is all about the product expansion. What products? What are the next products that they need in their customer journey to achieve their goals? This is where the brand becomes operational.

Josh Hadley 01:12:38  So this is how you actually execute the brand. Because everything we talked about initially was like kind of this nebulous, like, you know, what a brand is and the concept, but this is truly where the brand becomes real and where actually, like, rubber meets the road. So if you don’t own every stage of these customer touchpoints, someone else’s experience will fill in those gaps for you and you don’t want to leave it up to them. Step number 15. This is, I think, one of the most important aspects that gets overlooked on a regular basis. But step 15 is to run a monthly brand review. Now, why would you be doing this run this once a month? Because it keeps the brand from drifting. There’s a reason why there are there are terms called there are brand managers for big corporations. What’s their job as the brand manager? Basically to own all of those other 14 steps that I just walked you through. That’s their role. Somebody is actually overseeing that. So if you are the the business owner, this is your role.

Josh Hadley 01:13:36  You are the brand owner. You are the brand manager. So this is how brand becomes management discipline, not just a one time workshop. Okay. So what is a monthly brand meeting agenda look like? So here’s what it could look like. There’s 12 different questions. Number one what associations are we trying to build. Number two where did we where did we repeat it. Well where did we repeat our messaging over and over again. Well number three where did we prove it this month? Okay. Where where did we prove that that promise that we’re trying to say that we’re delivering to the customer. How did we prove it? Number four, where did the experience deliver it? Number five, what touch points weakened it? Number six what did customers actually say? Number seven what product strengthened the brand? Number eight which products actually confused the brand? Number nine which ads sold but maybe diluted our brand messaging. Number ten which creators best represented our brand? Number 11. What should we repeat? Number 12 what should we stop? And so by going to Syria, like a series of those 12 questions every month, you’re just kind of like you’re staying in your lane and you’re making sure you make the necessary adjustments, because guess what? Brand building is a life.

Josh Hadley 01:14:48  Like, this is a growing organism, so to speak, that needs to be nurtured over time. So track behavior, not just opinions. So these metrics are going to tell you if the brand is actually getting stronger or not. So now that we’ve answer those questions now we want to dive into actual metrics that will tell us are we actually building a brand or are we not. So under awareness and memory, there’s like three different kind of like phases of metrics that I would say there are awareness and memory. Branded search volume. Is our branded search volume increasing or decreasing. This should be part of my monthly brand review. Number two do we have direct and organic traffic? Did that increase or decrease to my website share of search? How does your brand and share of search compare with your competitors? And every month you should have a change month over month. Are we growing? Are we declining and why? Social mentions. There’s a lot of social listening tools out there, but what’s the number of views or social mentions or I guess, kind of engagement that you’re getting? Next is all about trust and conversion.

Josh Hadley 01:15:49  What is your branded traffic conversion rate? So not just your conversion rate on your website, but like when somebody types in your brand name and your product, what does that conversion rate look like? Because if it’s a really high conversion rate means something good is happening. Like they trust you, they probably saw you on a podcast or saw somebody else post about you or whatever, or maybe it was a friend that referred to them so that their intent is extremely high. You don’t even need to sell them. That’s already been done somewhere else. Returning visitor conversion rate. So returning somebody that’s coming back to your website, what does their conversion rate look like? What’s your review quality? Obviously this is pretty basic, but like are your reviews getting better or worse? You should also track your email opt in rates. Are those growing your product page conversion rate, your quiz completion rate that’s on your website. And then last but not least under retention and advocacy. So retention what is your repeat purchase rate. Is that increasing or decreasing your returning customer revenue.

Josh Hadley 01:16:50  Increasing or decreasing time to a second purchase. Is that time getting shorter or longer, meaning shorter the better? We are at getting customer to purchase one product on day one and product two on day two, the better. What is your loyalty participation, participation rate, your email, open rate, your SMS, click through rates and revenue share. And then last but not least, your advocacy. What about your referral revenue? Okay, if you have a referral program, your UGC volume is that increasing decreasing creator inbound interest review language quality customer stories, organic community activity. So do you have to measure all of those? No, but I just want to give you like here are metrics that you could actually measure to define. Yes, we are actually building our brand. Or no. Like it’s not. It’s this nebulous thing, right? Too many people see branding as just this, like pie in the sky. Oh, I think our our brand is getting better. I think it’s getting more recognizable.

Josh Hadley 01:17:44  Here’s what I would say. If you’re under $1 million a year, absolutely nobody knows about you. If you’re under even $10 million a year, you’re probably known in very, very fragmented markets that are very, very small. If you’re a nine figure business, you’re now probably beginning to gain at least a good amount of awareness. But you’re definitely not like a national, well-known brand until you get to probably $1 billion in revenue at that point, that’s where you’re nationally recognizable, right? You that’s like an apple where people would be able to spot your brand out and say, like, yeah, I know that brand. Okay. So that like, just remember that you need to continue to like reemphasize this month over month. So here are your North Star metrics. If you actually care about building a brand and creating generational wealth and creating something generationally that can impact society for the better and could be passed down for generations. Then stop obsessing over acquisition and instead ask one question. Are these metrics getting stronger? And the metrics that you should actually care about are repeat purchase rate, 12 month customer retention, your branded search volume, your direct traffic to your website, your email revenue as a percentage of your overall revenue, and a percentage of revenue from returning customers.

Josh Hadley 01:18:58  That’s it. Those are your core key KPIs that I would look at. And that also means you’re probably not focused on tacos, Roas, KAC, CPMs, or click through rates. Those are important metrics, don’t get me wrong. But if you’re trying to build something that’s going to sustain decades long, then you’re going to be focused more on that customer journey and you’re building customers, not just trying to arbitrage a sale in the here and now. So here’s what the brand ladder looks like. Looks like customers don’t arrive at loyalty in one step, they actually progress through a hierarchy of relationship depth and economic value of of a customer increases significantly at each level. So at the very beginning you have awareness and satisfaction. They know you. They know that the product works as expected to go further up this funnel or this ladder or this pyramid. You delight the customer, right? The experience actually exceeds their expectations and it builds an emotional connection with you and your brand, the product in that customer. Then number three, if you’re getting customers to engage, they share, they refer, they participate in your brand story.

Josh Hadley 01:20:06  Number two, this is where they exemplify loyalty. They return to your store without any incentives, and they trust any of your new product launches. And then last but not least, this is where you have a brand ambassador or empowerment. And it’s all about like buying from you says something about who they are You have been able to get inside the mind of that customer, that when they buy it, they feel like they are achieving their aspirational identity that they are after. That is ultimately what you are trying to convey with your brand. Okay, so as you go through your brand exercise, here’s a few questions I would ask your customers in post checkout surveys or even you as the business owner, actually jumping on a call with your customers and asking them this. Number one, what’s the first thing you think of when you hear our name? Number two, what company would you buy from instead of us and why? Number three, what makes us different from the alternatives? Number four who do you think this brand is for? Number five, how disappointed would you be if we disappeared? And number six, what would you tell your friend about us? Those are the questions you should be asking customers.

Josh Hadley 01:21:16  Because when you do, you will get insights that will then allow you to tailor your approach even further. Step number 16. This is where we protect and compound the meaning. So brand building is ongoing. Every new decision is either a deposit or a withdrawal in that brand building. Okay. A product company asks can we sell this or is there enough keyword volume? Is there enough blue ocean less competitors? Or a brand asks Will this make everything else easier to sell later? You need to apply these filters before every major decision. So here’s the brand extension test. Before you ever extend your brand. Before you decide to get into different product categories, ask yourself these questions. Does number one, does this serve the same customer? Number two, does it serve the same outcome or the promise that we promised the original customer with our hero skew? If it supports the core promise, then then that’s a good sign. Gate number three does it reinforce what you want the brand to mean? And these associations that you’re trying to pair them with? Or does it introduce a conflicting signal? And then last but not least, Do customers believe that this company, your brand, has the credibility to make this product? Or are they thinking like where in the world did you come up with that idea? Why are you now selling me supplements when you’ve been a stationery brand for the past decade? Those are the questions you should be asking yourself.

Josh Hadley 01:22:38  Here are some of the brand risks to watch out for. Every brand has has specific vulnerabilities tied to its core meaning. Knowing yours in advance is the most efficient form of brand protection. So with Boom Beauty, they have to protect themselves from adopting any anti-aging language or hey, look younger, feel younger or anything like that. With Patagonia, it’s, you know, they have to avoid being seen as cheap or having disposable products that are low durability and, you know, aren’t really quality and don’t last for multiple seasons and for liquid death. They got to make sure that they don’t come off as like a wellness company. That’s preaching why you need to, you know, drink water to avoid cancer or something like that in the future. Rather, for them, it’s all about this kind of like rebellion, humor and aspirational identity to just be different while also being healthy at the same time. So here’s the complete 16 step framework. I’ve boiled it down here, but the most important thing that I think you want to see is this products generate transactions, brands create the preference.

Josh Hadley 01:23:41  This is why brands are able to command premium pricing. It’s why they’re able to get repeat purchases. It’s why new product launches go off theoretically without a hitch. That’s why you should be after a brand. In addition to that, when it comes time to exit, a brand is ten times more meaningful and a lot more valuable than you’re just kind of like arbitrage business on Amazon. That’s worth a 2 or 3 x multiple on your EBITDA. Last but not least, the goal is not to sell something different. The goal is to make buying from you mean and feel something different. So to boil it all down, pick one customer avatar. Pick 3 to 5 core associations that you’re going to consistently reinforce. And then last but not least, you compound that message and story every day. Express and protect the meaning over time. If you have gone through all of this, I know this was a lengthy, in-depth, brand building exercise and process. But again, I did this for myself because I did this for our own team.

Josh Hadley 01:24:41  As we begin our own journey of becoming a nine figure brand. Becoming known for something is going to be paramount. And so if you want to do the same thing for yourself, here is a custom GPT to help you create your own brand. It’s going to walk you through these 16 different frameworks, have you answer questions, and then allow you to build your own brand, and it will guide you along the own process. It’s like I’m sitting down with you and helping you build and craft your own brand. And guess what? If you don’t like custom GPT or you want to build your own cloud skills or a different LLM of your choice, here’s a copy of these slides. Grab a copy of these slides. You can obviously upload them to the LM of choice and have it walk you through building your own brand. I, I went and studied the market for something that was extremely comprehensive. That was like, here are this step by step playbook to actually build a brand, because a lot of the content that’s out there is just like how to build a brand.

Josh Hadley 01:25:33  And it’s this kind of like nebulous idea of like, what a brand and what a brand is and what a brand is not. My purpose today was to hopefully share with you actionable strategies, things you can implement and actually operationalize to make building a brand make a lot more sense. If you found value in today’s podcast Systems and focus, start here. If you would be so kind as to leave a review on your favorite podcast platform of choice, then number two share this episode with an operator or somebody else who needs to hear this message. And then last but not least, share this message in a mastermind group. Put it in your slack community, or put it in a on LinkedIn in whatever communities that you’re in. But systems and focus scale, distraction kills. I hope this made sense to you today. And until next time, good luck!