You are a label
A few days ago I came across an article in Fast Company’s design newsletter depicting an issue IBM had a few years ago.
The articles read: “Some years ago, IBM had a problem. They made a giant mainframe computer, or Big Iron, as they call it in the industry. IBM’s Big Iron was acknowledged to be the best in the business, a generation ahead of its rivals. It was perfect, except for one thing: It wasn’t selling. So IBM’s ad agency did some one-on-one interviews with the kind of people who go shopping for Big Iron.
Big Blue reeled from what it heard. “Sure,” said the CIOs, “this bad boy is the best thing for us to buy. But if I recommend IBM, the conversation in the washroom will go, ‘Joe’s one of those old-school IT guys. We need somebody from the next generation.’ And that’s game over for my career.””
CIOs buy or don’t buy multimillion-dollar computers not because of its features or benefits, quality reliability, etc., but because of the brand image it has.
No matter what you’re selling, you are a label. Most of us think of brands when it is a consumer end product (cars, perfumes, clothes, pop, etc.) not as much as B2B or products such as IBM’s Big Iron or drilling machines, but the fact is, if you’re selling a product or service, someone is buying it, and therefore you have an audience and that audience judges you and makes their decision based on your brand image and reputation.
Weather you like it or not, you are a label. The sooner you start paying attention to your label (your brand) the better it will work for you.
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