In general, the marketing and branding principals are the same for a sole practitioner as they are for a small business or a large business, but the tactics of implementation are different.

Building a Brand Image
It is important to realize that brands exist in the minds of the consumers. A large company's brand is built by means of their marketing and advertising and maintained through the quality of its products or services and the customer's interactions with the company. Each consumer's impression of a brand – that brand's image, if you will – is made up of the marketing impressions the consumer has received and the contacts he or she has had with it.

A brand is affected positively or negatively at every touch point. If we buy a company's product and it falls apart when we try to use it, we form an immediate negative opinion of the brand, no matter what their marketing expounds. In fact, if our experience is contrary to the impression their marketing gives us, we may develop even stronger negative feelings.

Similarly, our impressions of service providers are affected by every interaction with the company's representatives and services.

As a sole practitioner, your brand isn't going to be built around a marketing message you spend millions advertising, it is going to be built around you: your capabilities, your expertise, your execution and follow-through, your personality, your communication skills, and how you present yourself. You make up every touch point, and clients' impressions of you and your brand are affected positively or negatively with each interaction with you, personally.

Talk to Lots of People
Back when I was a young graphic designer, I got involved with a multi-level marketing company, a competitor of Amway named Bestline. Like most people, I didn't make much money at it, but I did receive some great sales and motivational training. I've always remembered something the sales trainer said. He told us that the key to being successful in that business was to "be super nice and talk to lots of people every day." Your technique and presentation will improve with time, he said, but even if you stand on a street corner and ask everyone who walks by, "You wouldn't want to buy any soap, would you?" sooner or later someone is going to say, "Yeah, I need some soap. What have you got?"

One thing most professionals don't like to do is sell. So, what some do is, with a sigh of relief, take a break from developing new contacts and leads when they get a couple of leads that seem warm. That business may be a month off – if it turns into business – but they pin their hopes on it. Of course, that month can easily turn into two or three or six, or the prospect may fizzle out completely.

Instead of selling, concentrate on "being super nice and talking to lots of people every day." The best way to do that is to network. Network your ass off. The more people who know you, the more likely they are going to know or hear of someone who needs what it is you do.

Now combine that with a good, clear brand statement, and you're onto something.

It's One Thing
In total, a brand is known for one thing, whether it is "absolutely, positively overnight" or "finger-lickin' good." Remember the movie City Slickers, starring Billy Crystal and Jack Palance? In it, Jack, the wizened old cowboy, tells Billy that the secret of life is "one thing." So it is with branding. You just have to figure out what that one thing is.

Do you know what that one thing is for you? If not, you haven't learned the secret yet.

Nobody wants to exclude possible business, so we tend to sell ourselves as having a broad range of capabilities. People ask what you do, and you give them a laundry list. But people can't remember what's on a laundry list, so if that is what you tell people, what is it they are going to remember? Little or nothing. You are just another among the many professionals they have met. You are just another brand X.

KISS
Keep It Simple, Stupid. The simpler and clearer you state what it is you do and why you are better/different from all the others who do something similar, the more likely people are to remember. Sure, it may exclude some things on your laundry list, but that doesn't matter. You are only going to be remembered for one thing anyway, so it's best if you control what that is. The challenge is to come up with one thing that encompasses the most important elements of your business.

I was at a networking function last year where each person had the opportunity to stand up and give their 30-second elevator speech. One participant was an investment advisor. If he had said the typical, "I help small business people invest wisely and plan for their future, and yadda, yadda, yadda," I would have long forgotten him. Instead, what he said was that he helps people make work optional. Now there is someone you want to remember! That is a simple and brilliant brand statement.

Become an Expert
Another way to boost your credibility is to become recognized as an expert. Certainly there is something you can claim expertise in.  If you don't have some expertise, what are you doing working independently? Let people know about it by writing articles and giving talks. When you have published articles and/or speaking engagements under your belt, people can easily acknowledge you as an expert.

Another way is to volunteer your expertise with a non-profit organization. Non-profits welcome volunteer help, and that pro-bono work can help build your reputation with others who are involved with the organization or who learn of your work there.

Be a Resource
In a world where it seems like everyone needs more business so is always pitching, people who ask what they can do for you are like an oasis in a desert. The more you can be a resource for others, the more likely they are to want to remember you, talk with you, and send leads your way.

There was a fellow I met through one organization who was always pitching. He was like the stereotypical insurance salesman that everyone shuns. He would come up and say hello, how're you doing, and then launch into who are you doing work for now, and how can you send some of their needs our way? He never inquired about how you were doing out of interest or concern, only how there might be business in it for him. It comes as no surprise that I and others in the group started avoiding him.

On the other hand, if you can be a resource, be a matchmaker, people will welcome you with open arms and tend to think of how they can offer you something.

I learned this lesson well when I was running marketing for a software startup. For young companies like that, PR is very important, and it is much harder for small companies to get ink than for the Microsofts and Intels of the world. As a result, magazine and newspaper editors are bombarded with releases and story pitches by such companies and their PR representatives. I realized that writers and editors always need resources for industry information. By establishing myself and our company as a resource for editors rather than always pitching them, they started calling me instead of my having to contact them all the time! We were always included in appropriate articles, and when we did send them something, I knew it would get their attention.

Do's & Don'ts
I suppose there are some self-employed people who want to look home-brewed and like they work cheaply. Most independents I know would like to look like a bigger, more established entity in the hopes of attracting larger, more profitable clients. Yet many of them hurt themselves with little things that pull back the curtain on their Great and Powerful Oz-ness and show them for what they really are. Here are some mistakes I've run across that pull back the curtain:*

• Don't use free business cards that have an imprint of them that says they are free! If you can't afford to have business cards printed, how professional do you look?
• Similarly, don't use cards and stationery obviously printed on those preprinted design blanks from Office Depot. Everyone knows that is what that stuff is, and it brands you as a small-time operation.
• Don't use an AOL or free Webmail (Hotmail, Yahoo, etc.) email address … or Earthlink or another ISP for that matter. Sorry, it's just not professional.* See the next item.
• Do have your own domain. If you are in business, you need to have your own domain and a decent Web site there. (A domain is "www.yourcompany.com.") Having a domain name costs less than $10 per year these days. Even if you can't afford a Web site yet, get your domain name and "park" it with a hosting service for a few bucks a month. Then you can have a real email address in the form, yourname@yourcompany.com.
• When you do have a Web site, don't require site visitors to use a specific browser to view your site, i.e., Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Very bad form. Not even Microsoft does that! Make sure your Web developer makes your site cross-browser compatible.
• Don't let them put a counter on your site. No one cares if they are visitor number 473. In fact, you don't want them to know they are only visitor number 473!
• Don't have some complex instructions on your voicemail for sending you a fax. If faxes are that important to your business, get a separate fax line or subscribe to an online service that provides you with a number and delivers faxes to you by email.

Become a Guerrilla Marketer
For more information and tactics for promoting yourself, there are a whole slew of "Guerrilla Marketing" books written by Jay Levinson. Check your local library or book store. Guerrilla marketing tactics are free and low-cost things you can do to help promote yourself and build your business.

And, you can start by being super nice and talking to lots of people everyday. Keep working on your brand statement, and network, network, network.

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*These apply to people in business, not necessarily jobseekers.

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Copyright 2005 by Reid M. Neubert. All rights reserved.