I’m Sapna Pieroux: designer, author, speaker and award-winning founder of brand consultancy InnerVisions ID. My book Let’s Get Visible! launched in January 2020, became a #1 best-selling title and won an award at the Business Book Awards in March 2020.
I’m also a Brand Mentor for national entrepreneur programme Shifts to Success and a business mentor for Westmont Enterprise Hub at the University of West London.
I help business owners gain brand clarity, stand out in their industry and supercharge their business growth using my own VISION process a.k.a. ‘Branding that means Business’.
In the last 25 years I’ve worked as a designer, a marketer and in media sales, creating sponsorship and promotions content-led campaigns for brands including restaurants, tourist boards and operators. My agency has worked with events caterers, restaurant chains and hospitality business coaches. I was also on a panel at the Travel Expo in October 2019 talking about digital marketing for the travel industry.
Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, said “Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.”
Right now (during the lockdown) no one is in the room.
So your brand is more important than ever - never more so in the restaurant and hospitality industry. Employees are being furloughed and contract workers being let go. Some venues have continued to provide a take-out/ delivery service, but what else can you do to be able to bounce back when the pandemic is over?
Many business owners are using this time to stop, reflect, perhaps reinvent a little.
There is much less money sloshing round, so whilst you may not be considering a rebrand, understand that your brand is about so much more than your logo (That’s the biggest misconception and mistake that business owners make!).
So what is your ‘brand’?
Your brand is your reputation. The logo is a tiny part of your brand, albeit most visible, like the tip of an iceberg with so much that lies beneath. Your brand is every touch-point and experience of your business from online booking to reviews, website to menus, interiors (including reception, cloakrooms bathrooms) and exteriors, staff knowledge, service and appearance, food and wine quality/choice, music and lighting, your marketing, social media and aftercare (what, if any, follow up do you have after your diner leaves the restaurant?).
Clearly, there is lots of work you can do on your brand right now.
I’m going to share with you some of the foundational work I do with my clients to help them get real clarity in their business and build their brand.
My VISION process has six steps to building your brand: The first three that I will go through in this post are about brand strategy. You can do these yourself, although I advise involving as many of your team as you can (video chat is a lifesaver right now!). The second three are more design-led so I recommend using a professional for these stages when you’re ready.
VISUALISE - Your FABs, Vision and Customer Vision.
INNER BRAND - Your Brand Values, Personality and Voice
STAND OUT - Competitor Analysis (and wider inspiration).
IMAGE – Type, Colour, Imagery (these are the three elements for any business – but for the hospitality industry this will also include interior, exterior and staff image)
OUTPUT – Brand Guidelines, Websites, Brochures, etc
NURTURE – Looking after and growing your brand
Visualise
Your FABs: Time to dream! FABs are your Five Aspirational Brands. Choose five brands that you admire or aspire to be like from a business point of view. These are the brands that make you say, “I’d love for my company to be like that because …” They can be in or out of your industry – a mix is good.
It might be the experience, the customer service, the way they make you feel, the little things they do…what do you find amazing in other brands? (Hint, people rarely say “It’s the logo”, proving your brand is not just your logo!) Look for the trends: this is what you should build into your own company brand.
As part of Visualise we also look at your VISION for the future. Think 3-5 years, not just short term to help you think beyond Covid, about longevity and stop you being too reactive.
Acknowledge where you are right now (or where you were pre-Covid!) and all you have achieved, then write down where you want to be, what you want to be known for, the reputation you want: why customers will want to spend with you, and why staff and suppliers will want to work with you.
Next: your Customer Vision. What are their problems that you can solve? (for different occasions and budgets perhaps). What difference will you make to their lives? This helps you create the perfect experience for your customers, beyond just the food.
Right now, a problem they have is that they can’t come to your establishment, so you need a way to keep yourselves in hearts and heads. You could offer customers priority bookings when lockdown is over, say. Or deliver your best wines to your customers at bargain prices so they can have a little experience of your venue till you meet again. Or invite people to book a table for your end of lockdown party.
Stay current in their minds by sharing a few of your chef’s most-popular recipes on video. Give it away for free or charge a small amount for a live cookery class - it won’t stop people wanting to eat at your establishment when this is over. Or get your chefs cooking meals for key workers and ask people to donate.
Inner Brand
How your company treats your staff, customers and suppliers now is how you will be remembered when the good times roll again.
Values are the things that will keep your customers loyal through thick and thin. You are loyal to brands you feel share your own values.
Identifying your brand values is really important. Not only will it help you decide how to react in times of stress, but later, will help you decide how you conduct your business, who to hire (and maybe even fire). Take some time to really delve into and understand them.
Think about the non-negotiables. How do you want your business to be known, remembered, talked about, by others? Look back at your FABs - what do those brands have that you aspire to?
Establish 3-7 brand values (too many will be forgotten!). It’s essential to involve your team on this as they have to ‘live the brand’ too, so ask them what they feel your business brand values should be. Frame them. Have them in your office. Live by them.
For example, if one of your brand values is that you are ethical, it’s not enough to just buy recycled loo roll! Everyone in the company must look after your staff and suppliers as well as your customers – as well as the community and wider world.
Your brand personality and voice are how these values are portrayed in the imagery and copy you put out there, but also in your own personal brand, how you are showing up online for your audience.
You may have reined in your communications over lockdown, but don’t abandon your audience totally. Share how you are coping, perhaps how you are helping others and how others can get involved. Share secrets from your chefs or bartenders, home-spa ideas or lockdown cocktails and playlists. Use this time to build meaningful conversations with your customers. Ask for feedback and find out what your customers really want.
Brand voice is really important. Depending on your brand personality, a brand voice that is empathetic and caring may strike the right tone with your audience, or you may take a more uplifting and positive tone to raise spirits and inspire.
Stand Out
The third phase of the VISION process is Stand Out. A quick Google search of ‘Pizza in Ealing’ for me brought up…
In order to get noticed, you have to stand out from the crowd. But how? Looking better than the competition always helps (as well as a website that works, but that’s another blog post!).
This stage starts with a competitor analysis is so you can see what is working and what isn’t in terms of branding in your industry. Also look at which other brands (including the FABs) are getting it right. This is a great way of working out what you love - and hate – i.e. becoming more visually literate, before you brief a designer..
Identify your industry norms and clichés: and to stand out, do something different!
Gather inspiration from your industry and related industries and/or your FABs for fresher thinking, e.g. when I was branding a tiling business the industry looked bloody awful! So we looked at the world of interior design instead. This led to a far more stylish and stand-out solution (below).
In hospitality, clichés are rife. Italian restaurants will use green, white and red (of course), bad script or handwritten fonts and may even have a cartoon of a plump moustachioed chef with a pizza or plate of pasta. In order to stand out and visually demonstrate your difference, don’t follow the clichés! There are three visual elements to your branding: type, colour and imagery - you can use to stand out.
Don’t forget to look at every aspect of your branding, from logo to menus, signage, interiors, exteriors, staff presentation/uniform, etc. Everything should ‘go’ together, so if you’re really stuck, keep things simple. Less is more.
When I worked on the Centenary Lounge rebrand (read the full story here) I worked with the interior designers to make sure the menus and website had the same colour scheme as the interiors.
So as you can see there’s a lot more to think about before you consider a rebrand. The biggest mistake I see is business owners rushing to get a logo designed before considering the brand strategy.
A rebrand or brand refresh will definitely help reposition your company for when lockdown is over but using this time to work on your brand strategy first will make sure you save time and avoid costly mistakes in the future.
If you need help or want to talk brand strategy, book in for a free 30 minute Clarity Call with me here.
Buy my book on branding, Let’s Get Visible! (Highly Commended, Business Book Awards 2020) here.
You can find Sapna on Twitter/ Instagram/ Facebook and LinkedIn, Do connect with her for your Branding requirements!