What is A Corporate Identity?
The “Corporate Identity,” is much more than a corporate pitch or core story, and has an extremely valuable purpose as the central organizing ingredient of any company. A great Corporate Identity can dramatically improve training, client access, closing ratios, profitability, and more. The one absolute in business is consistency and efficiency, and a well-researched Corporate Identity will stimulate both at every turn.
Consistency in the corporate race is speed. It’s that simple. Those that understand this win the race. We would all agree if every time you make a sale you lose money, consistency is the quickest way to the poor house. So the opposite is also true. Consistency is the equivalent of speed, and those entrepreneurs, executives, managers and salespeople that get it slaughter their competition no matter what the industry.
Efficiency is the biggest byproduct of creating and implementing a great Corporate Identity, and is the last free thing the business world has to offer. It is generated by brainpower, not dollars, and every move you make toward greater efficiency is money that goes directly into your pocket.
A great Corporate Identity does all this and more. It creates the organizational centerpiece that all business core profit centers coalesce. A Corporate Identity uses data and storytelling as a retention assistant and motivator, and once created, supercharges training new personnel, teaching sales people and other employees all the subtleties of why prospects should buy their product or service, and aligning every aspect of business profitability. Since consistency and efficiency are #1, implementing a great Corporate Identity is the most important step any company can take toward growing profits by doing things smarter–not working harder.
What Can A Killer Corporate Identity Accomplish?
Anytime we work with entrepreneurs and business executives the first thing we always define is that there is only 24 hours in a day that we can work. Once this is the basis for what is possible, to quadruple profits, supercharge sales, and dramatically increase closing ratios, can only come to fruition via smarter thinking, more innovative strategies, and the creativity of the managers and entrepreneurs running the company.
Being the best at something is not about learning to do 5000 things, it’s about doing a few dozen things 5000 times consistently and efficiently. This is most important for entrepreneurs and managers in the business world. As great as Michael Jordan was, and I’m a Knick fan, rest assured he took millions of jump shots so that he would be the greatest when the moment of truth arrived. And as flamboyant and spectacular as he was, to win championships, he had to learn to consistently be the best at a few things, and trust that others around him could do the same. Great businesspeople, like anyone great, must be consistent and efficient, and confident enough to always surround themselves with giants. As the great David Ogilvy wrote to all of his new managers, “If you hire people who are smaller then you we will become a small company full of dwarves. But if you have the courage to hire people that are bigger than you are, we will become a great company full of giants.” A great Corporate Identity will help every level of executive laser focus on what they are great at, and support the confidence to employ superstars at every level, in every position.
Zappo’s, one of the USA’s fastest growing companies, and located right here in Las Vegas, has a policy of paying TRAINEES $4000 to leave after training if they are not the greatest fit. You don’t think they are paying superstars to leave do you?
A great Corporate Identity sets the stage to accomplish all this with one incredible business tool. It creates the basis for easy sales rapport and consistency throughout many company departments, and when implemented as the central internal corporate message, it naturally works its way to prospects, clients and even your competition. Imagine being positioned in your marketplace where the competition has to hear from you before making important decisions.
What Happens When You Implement Your Corporate Identity?
When you implement your Corporate Identity internally with your employees and future employees 5 things immediately happen:
- Creates corporate unanimity and consistency
- Stimulate the Core Profit Centers to all move in same direction
- Establishes you as the Leader
- Sets the internal corporate environment
When you present your Corporate Identity to prospects and client’s two things happen:
- You will favorably alter prospects buying criteria or biases by utilizing research, information, fear and excitement.
- You will gain unqualified credibility, respect, and trust by demonstrating your depth of knowledge of the marketplace, and your understanding of their business.
Building a Corporate Identity isn’t easy. But creating greatness never is. If you want to be the ultimate player in your industry, you must to take the time and carefully craft a “Corporate Identity.” Using research data as a powerful access vehicle; a gripping fundamental message that not only connects with your existing consumers, but gets the attention of new prospects; and graphics that enhance and visually tell your company’s story, describe the key ingredients to create your Corporate Identity.
