I would like us to go deeper because there is a lot more there that we can actually dig into and implement into your brand to actually make your brand really special and really unique. One, two, three, four. So you're building a brand online. You've got wild AF dreams. You know you've got the potential to grow your business into something pretty day incredible, and you want to do it all the right way.
Hey, I'm Alex, your brand bestie, and this is Brandology, the podcast that feels like a coffee chat with the biz friend who's giving you all the tips and advice on growing your brand, because that's what it is. We're talking strategy, design, content, messaging, and more. So if you're ready for no BS brand advice from someone who's done it all before, this is the pod for you. Let's get into it. Hello, and welcome back to the Brandology podcast. I hope you're doing so well this week.
I am really hot. Again, I'm sitting out in the lounge room, so it's noisy. There's cars going past. I have a fan pointed at me. So Apologies for the noise. And also my dogs are just roaming around. They're probably going to start fighting at some point, but we're going to just try and roll with it. I was supposed to record this episode earlier this morning, but it didn't happen. So we're taking the time that we can get and we're doing it.
And that's exactly the way that I want you to be building your brand every single week. And this is what I do. Sometimes things don't go to plan. Sometimes the things that you've scheduled in or what you intended to do didn't happen for some reason. But I want you to try and find the time that you can find each day to do a bit of work on your brand.
If you can do 20 to 30 minutes of work on your brand each day, and that could be in terms of content creation, that could be in terms of messaging tweaks or writing more messaging for a new page on your website, that could be outreach, whatever it is. If you can just find a small snippet of time each day, it doesn't matter when it is, to dedicate to your brand. Your brand is going to grow. It's going to become more known, and it's going to turn into that brand that you really want it to be.
It's not about being perfect. It's about progression every day. A small little piece of progression every single day is how you grow a successful brand. So what I actually wanted to chat to you about today in this episode is something that comes up with many of my clients. So I wanted to bring this conversation to you as well because it might be something that you are thinking about or you've implemented in your business. But what it is, is saying, oh, my brand's a luxury brand.
My brand is a high-end brand. My brand's a premium brand, for example. And wanting your brand to feel luxury and high-end premium. And then also being like, okay, I want my brand to feel this way because I'm trying to attract high-end clients and high-ticket clients, for example. So This is something that comes up a lot, as I said, with my clients. Honestly, probably 50 to 60 % of my clients come to me saying, I want a luxury brand. I want a premium brand. I want premium clients.
So that's why I want this premium brand. And that makes sense on paper. You have a service, for example, that you're charging high ticket prices for. So you're trying to attract in people who have enough money to spend on those services. And so by extension, you want your brand to feel like it's at that level of value and that level of premiumness and luxury. So people can immediately be like, oh, this is a high-end brand. This is a premium brand.
And I have the money for that, so I'm going to hang around and buy from you. So the logic on paper makes sense. But what I have actually found with many of my clients who've come to me and chatted to me about this and said, oh, I have a luxury brand. I have high-end clients, is that they actually don't have a luxury brand. That's not what we should be using to describe many of their brands. Not everyone. Some people, yes, really do have luxury, high-end premium brands.
But for a lot of people, this is the only descriptor they have in their mind. Oh, I'm a high-end brand, I'm a premium brand. And that alone as a descriptor is not going to be helpful for you. That's not going to get you where you want to go. And it's not going to actually result in you bringing in the clients that you want, if that's really the main thing that you're using to describe your business.
So what I always encourage my clients to do when we have this conversation about, is your brand really a luxury brand? Is that really how we want to portray it to bring in your audience? Because what we're really looking at here, the only thing that we're using of any value to us from our audience is their money and just being like, okay, this audience group that we're trying to bring in, they have enough money to spend. And that's all we care about.
And that's all we're using in our brand, our visual brand and our verbal brand to attract them. And honestly, that's not really fair on your audience to think like that because your audience has a lot more going for them than how much money they have in their pocket. And at the same time, you can't judge that someone in your audience can't afford to work with you.
Some people might not have a lot of money, but they are willing to save up and invest in this service because it's so important to them. They might have parents or a partner who are happy to help them invest in something. They might be happy to go on an extended payment plan. Like, whatever the case may be, they might be able to get a government grant. We don't know.
And we should not be thinking, Oh, I just want to attract clients with money because that's a high-ticket client, and that's what I want in my brand. It's totally fine to be like, Okay, my services are more of a premium price. They're a higher price. I want people to come in knowing that and being fully aware of that before they work with me. I don't want any nasty surprises.
I want to make sure that I'm bringing in the right people who either have that money or are happy to save up and earn that money to invest in me. That's okay to think like that. But if we're just looking at our target audience and that's the only thing that we're thinking about is how much money do they have? Can they afford to work with me? Then that is not the way we should be going about target audience research or target audience attraction.
And usually, like I said, this is why a lot of us are like, oh, I want a premium brand. I want my brand to feel very luxurious and very high-end, is because you are thinking, well, I'm charging a fair amount for my services and I want people to come in and be able to pay that. And my experience, a lot of the time, I think, okay, my experience is very high-end as well. Okay, great. Great. That's great. But that's So not enough. That's not enough to build a brand around.
It's not enough to differentiate you. And I can tell you right now you have a lot more going for you. Your brand has a lot more going for it than just being like, oh, high-end, oh, luxury. So this is why when a lot of people come to me and say, oh, this is what my brand's like, this is what I would use to describe it, I would like us to go deeper because there is a lot more there that we can actually dig into and implement into your brand.
And same with your target audience, there's a lot more we can dig into and implement to actually make your brand really special and really unique, really reflect you, really reflect your audience, and stand out in your industry as a lane of one, a category of one.
And that's really we're trying to achieve here with all of the stuff that I teach is really helping you to become that lane of your own and be able to stand out and be the go-to choice for your dream clients and have it all feel very natural for you. So if this is you and you are thinking, oh, yeah, maybe I need to think a little bit more about my brand or my audience because I also just have these words, luxury, premium, high-end. They keep popping up over and over. Have a think about this.
So the first thing that I want you to think about is actually defining what a high-end or high-ticket or luxury, insert word here, defining what a high-end client actually is to you. And this is one of the first things I'll ask my clients when we go through this, because a lot of people say, Oh, my dream client, they are a high-end client, for example, like their high-end. What does that mean? What does that mean to you?
Because For one person, that might mean they pay their invoices on time, they come to calls on time, they really respect my expertise and my knowledge, and they're happy to hand all of the ideas and whatnot over to me. They fully trust me and my direction and my skills, and they're not trying to micromanage.
So for example, that could just be one person's definition of what they want a high-end client to look And then for somebody else, a high-end client might look like someone who pays in full, never goes on a payment plan, picks the highest tier package that you have to offer, always resigns, asks a lot of questions, really immerses themselves in the process, communicates with you regularly, whatever it is. You need to have a think about, what does a high-end client actually mean to me?
What do I value in a client like that? And if I could build my perfect client, what would I have them do? What would I have them be like? And how would I have them approach working with me? And payments, and what services they'd book, and if they would come back for more, or if they'd tell their friends, or how involved they would be with the process.
So these are all things that I really want you to think about and note down, because that's going to be very, very helpful when it comes to then figuring out how we want your brand to and feel and sound and act. Because if we don't know the client that we're trying to bring in, we're not going to know the brand that we need to build. And like I say many times, I've said it so often, we We need to look at our brand from two angles.
We need to look at it from our angle as in us as the business owner, particularly for solopreneurs, we need to love the brand. We need to be able to back the brand, back the messaging, back the visuals, and really be obsessed with all of that. But then on the other hand, we need to also build it around our audience and make sure it's something that they're going to love as well. If we have only half of the equation, we're not going to be able to create the brand that we want.
It's going to fall short somewhere along the line. It might be in a few weeks, it might be in a year, it might be in a few years. But we need to make sure we have both those halves coming in to actually build a sustainable brand. But a lot of this really comes back to knowing your audience. And it's something I go on about so much because it is so important.
If we don't know who we're selling to and we don't know who the ideal fit is for our service, the ideal fit who is going to actually really experience an amazing transformation from what it is we do, then we're not going to be able to build a brand that will attract them. It's as simple as that. If you don't know who you're talking to, you don't know what to say.
It's like someone came to me and said, Alex, I need you to do a presentation on branding and you're going to be presenting it to a group of people. The first thing I would want to know is, okay, great. Love that. But who was the group of people that I'm presenting it to? I need to know, is it year six students? If so, I'm going to need to really simplify this down and go back to absolute basics that a 12 year old is going to understand and absorb. Am I presenting this to new business owners?
Am I presenting this to branding experts who lead brand teams in big businesses? What group of people am I presenting this to? So then I can tailor the content and tailor what I'm saying to those people. So it's just like you. You know what you are selling and what it is that you do. And you know you have to sell it.
But unless you know the specific group of people that you are speaking to, you're not going to know what to say, how to say it, and how to visually design the brand to make sure that the message hits home and it speaks to the right person, it speaks to their soul, and it makes them go, oh, my God, I need So this is where we really have to get ultra abundantly crystal clear on our dream client. So the first step is going, okay, what does a high-end client mean to me?
If I am wanting to attract high-end, high-ticket clients, what does that mean to me? Let's design my perfect client, how they act, how they think, how they speak, how they go about the process, and then start from there. But beyond that, we need to know, in general, external of thinking of them as a high-end and premium client. We need to know What are they experiencing right now? What are their struggles? What are they wanting to solve? And why do they want to solve it now?
Why should they want it solved now? What are they experiencing? What are they feeling? And then we also want to look at the other side of the coin. How do they want things to feel? How do they want things to be solved? How do they want to be experiencing life or business or parenting or whatever the thing is that you help them with? How do they want to be experiencing that after? Like, what is their ultra dream state?
And And then we want to identify that pathway between A and B. So there's something that they're missing along the way. That's why they can't get there. That's why they need your help. We need to identify what that gap is. And then we need to educate them around that. We need to communicate that gap and show them that we have the answer to that gap. We can help them fill that gap and get to that dream state that they want to be in.
So we need to look at all these other areas as well as what does my dream high-end client look like and what makes them high to me? Because honestly, what you'll probably find from doing this process is there's other areas that you can hone in on other than, oh, they're high-end because they can afford my services, for example, or they're looking to spend X amount. That's not the most interesting thing about your client, and that's not the thing that's going to make them go, Oh, yeah, okay.
Well, because her brand looks fancy, I'm going to invest my thousands of dollars with her just because it feels fancy. That is not going to be enough. So that's why you need to do these ideal client exercises to help you figure out what else is actually super interesting about your ideal client that you can infuse into your brand. Another thing a lot of people do is they say in their Instagram bio, on their website or whatever, premium branding.
If you're a brand designer, you might have in your bio premium branding for small businesses or something like that. If you're a wedding photographer, I see this so much. I see people say, oh, luxury wedding photography. Okay, so if If you are using words like that in your messaging, I want you to step back and think, why am I using those words? You shouldn't have to necessarily say those words to communicate that your brand is a high-end brand.
It means that something else is lacking somewhere along the line. And also, again, just saying that word is not going to be enough to make a client who you deem as high ticket want to buy from you. So I want you to think if I'm saying premium branding or if I'm saying luxury luxury wedding photography or luxury wedding florals or whatever it is that you do, if you're saying words like that, what does that actually mean to you?
So again, I want you to go a little bit deeper here and think about, if I'm offering luxury wedding photography, what do I actually see as Luxury Wedding Photography? What does Luxury Wedding Photography mean to me? What are the elements that go into Luxury Wedding Photography? What is the difference between Wedding Photography and Luxury Wedding Photography? It cannot just be the price. It can't be the price. There has to be more that goes into it than that.
So I really want you to start identifying. And even if you don't use this language in your messaging, but you think of yourself as a luxury service provider, a high-end or premium XYZ, thinking about what is the difference between normal brand design or normal wedding photography or whatever, and high-end luxury brand design, and high-end luxury wedding photography. What I see as the difference.
So I really want you to go through that as well, because that's going to be really helpful in identifying some additional avenues of messaging that you can start to bring in to your brand rather than just using the word luxury or high-end, which are honestly severely overused at this point in time in many, many industries. Because at the end of the day, a lot of people think, I want a high-end brand so I can get high-end clients. That is the thought Process.
And like I said at the start of the episode, that is okay to think that there's nothing wrong with thinking that because on paper you are right. That's how it works. But when we look more deeply into it, we look into the competitive space and what's going on with other people out online who have similar businesses, that is not going to be enough to make your brand stand out.
And if your brand doesn't stand out in the right way to the right people, you are simply not going to find the success that you want with your brand. So just simply thinking, I want my brand to use a neutral colour palette and editorial style fonts and really flowery, descriptive, pretty messaging.
That's what I want in order to create this luxury feeling, then what that really shows is that you are primarily focused on, I charge a good amount of money for my services and I want people to know that straight away. And that also says to me that you You haven't looked deeply enough into your ideal client, you haven't looked deeply enough into your brand in itself to figure out what else is special and unique about it that you can bring in.
And like I said, there are some people where this is the method that's going to work. There are some brands that genuinely, like when you look into it, this is the way forward. But for most people who want a luxury brand, this is not the pathway I would go down because it's going to just have you blend in to an ocean of other people who have the same thought process and are doing the same thing. Because I have done many luxury brands for clients that don't look necessarily like luxury brands.
And that doesn't mean that they don't look beautiful and they don't look enticing and they don't look sophisticated or whatever it is. It just means like they don't follow the traditional luxury brand playbook that I just mentioned. And some that I'm thinking of off the top of my head, one is a little bit more feminine and almost a little bit boho-y Like quite organic, raw, natural, a bit boho-y, but very high-end, very lux.
The whole experience is very lux when you work with her, when you go into her clinic. It's a very beautiful start to finish experience and her prices are quite high. So whilst she's attracting in high-end clients, they're not coming in just because they have money.
They're coming to her because they have other reasons and other things that allow them to connect with her brand because she's actually made that clear in the visuals and the messaging and that overall start to finish experience that she's created. And there's another one that I have almost finished working with where the brand has some fairly bright colours coming in, a couple of bright pops of colour. We've got some really fun little hand-drawn illustrations coming into the brand.
She is a high-end premium brand. She charges high-end premium in prices for what she does. Her clients have the money to invest in this particular thing that she does. And the brand, whilst it's not that traditional luxury look, it stands out beautifully in her space. But most importantly, it's very aligned to her and her personality and her style that she brings into her work. She's a florist, so that makes sense.
And also just elements of her personality that her clients are going to interact with during the experience with her. So we wanted to bring in all of this into the brand to make sure that the right clients were coming to her. And yes, whilst they were more high-end clients and they were dream clients for her, we didn't want them coming to her purely on the basis of She looks like she has a luxury brand, so therefore I'm happy to spend my money with her because that's not how it works.
We have put other connexion points embedded within her brand to give her audience things to connect to other than just the cost of services. So overall, I just want you to remember, you can have a high-end brand, you can have a high-ticket brand, you can bring in high-end luxury clients, but I don't want that to be the main focal point of everything you're doing. I don't want that to be the only thing your brand has going for it, because in truth, it has so much more going for it.
And so does your ideal client. We just need to dig a little bit deeper, figure out what that is, and then embed that into your brand elements, so into your visual branding, into your messaging.
So we can still communicate what service this is, what experience you're offering, while we're creating a really nice feeling, a perception of what it's actually like to work with you rather than just making you this generic luxury brand that really doesn't have as much personality to it and your dream clients can easily overlook in favour of another luxury brand that's sitting right over there.
But don't let this deter you from thinking of your brand as luxury or high-end or you want high-end clients. But it's really just about going deeper with what that means and then being able to communicate that, plus those external things I chatted about in this podcast episode, like externally, what your dream client is like, externally, how we want people to feel and interact with your brand, bringing all of that in to your overall identity and your messaging. So I hope that was helpful.
I hope you got a few golden nuggets from this episode. If you are someone who has that luxury premium high-end mindset around your services, thank you so much for joining me this week, and I will see you back here next week for another episode. Thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of Brandology. I am so happy to have you here. I hope you got something out of this episode. If you did, I would so love it if you could hit that follow button on your podcast platform.
And if you really loved it, it would be so amazing if you could leave a review on Apple podcast. It really, really helps. I would also love it if you could share this podcast with your business besties because I'm dropping new episodes every week all about the soul and strategy behind building feel-less brands. And I would love to spread the word to as many entrepreneurs as I can. Thank you so much for listening. And I'll be back in your ears next week.