Branding, Business Culture and Inc. 5000

We recent­ly got back from the Inc. 5000 con­fer­ence in Orlan­do, Flori­da. Three days of intense insight allowed us to learn what strate­gies suc­cess­ful entre­pre­neurs used to build mul­ti-mil­lion dol­lar busi­ness­es. We learned so much that we had to share the knowl­edge. How­ev­er, it may be too long to include in one post. So, we decid­ed to include the top advice we got and include beau­ti­ful visu­als to sup­port it.

Before we dig into the valu­able lessons we learned, we want to thank Inc. Mil­i­tary Entre­pre­neurs, Natal­ie Thomas, Eric Schuren­berg, Elaine & Norm Brod­sky and all the spon­sors who made this possible!

Branding, Business Culture, and INC. 5000

The most com­mon top­ic in the con­fer­ence was need­ing clar­i­ty in your brand and hav­ing per­se­ver­ance to go through the ups and downs.

1.Perseverance

Jay Jay French, found­ing mem­ber and lead gui­tarist of Twist­ed Sis­ter, shared his years of strug­gles that led to the suc­cess of their band. No mat­ter the cir­cum­stances and the indus­try they were in, they remained true to their val­ues. They were a part of the Rock & Roll world, yet they chose to ignore the drugs part. Remain­ing true to their values/brand dur­ing 10 years of con­tin­u­al rejec­tion, their con­stant per­se­ver­ance led Twist­ed Sis­ters to fame. Dur­ing their years of rejec­tion, Jay Jay devel­oped a mind­set that allowed him to get over rejec­tion and use that process as oppor­tu­ni­ties to improve.

Take the rejec­tion as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to reflect on the path that you are on.  “Every rejec­tion has some truth to it,” said French. Remem­ber, brands evolve as they grow and look­ing for ways to improve dur­ing a rejec­tion is beneficial.

2. Business culture

Anoth­er impor­tant aspect of your brand is com­pa­ny cul­ture. No mat­ter the size of your com­pa­ny defin­ing what your cul­ture is will pro­vide a valu­able asset when hir­ing employ­ees — even how you con­duct busi­ness. “Cul­ture with­in your com­pa­ny defines who you are,” said Norm Brod­sky founder of CitiS­tor­age; part­ner at Black Gold Suites; colum­nist at Inc.; co-author of Street Smarts. Cul­ture builds up peo­ple and it allows them to feel a part of the com­pa­ny, not just an extension.

Build­ing a sol­id com­pa­ny cul­ture can take time, but here are three key areas to start with.

3. Clarity Towards Your Purpose 

It’s not just get­ting your employ­ees to under­stand it, they need to feel a part of it. Espe­cial­ly mil­len­ni­als who want to feel like their con­tri­bu­tions make a dif­fer­ence. “You also need to sim­pli­fy your mes­sage so that peo­ple can share it eas­i­ly,” said Adam Miller, Founder and CEO of Cor­ner­stone OnDemand.

4. Employee Engagement 

Get to know your employ­ees and find ways to empow­er them. Do not cre­ate so many rules. It could end up ham­per­ing your com­pa­ny and dimin­ish employ­ee interest.

5. Build Trust

Hir­ing peo­ple who seem trust wor­thy can be dif­fi­cult, but not impos­si­ble. One you have appoint­ed your leaders/specialists, estab­lish­ing trust in them is essen­tial. If you micro-man­age every­one not only does this make your employ­ees feel less val­ued, it can decrease engage­ment. Micro-man­age­ment usu­al­ly stems from sit­u­a­tions of inse­cu­ri­ty. Find ways to con­nect with your employ­ees — even your con­trac­tors. Build­ing trust out­side of the work envi­ron­ment can be ben­e­fi­cial. And look for ways to reward your employ­ees for their efforts.

6. Your Mission Supports Your Culture 

One of the most inspir­ing and suc­cess­ful exam­ples of a strong com­pa­ny cul­ture that sup­ports a mis­sion, is seen at Grav­i­ty Pay­ments. “Decide what to do for your com­pa­ny. Be part of a pur­pose. Your mis­sion is more impor­tant than pay. Every­body can afford to be nor­mal,” said Dan Price, Founder of Grav­i­ty Payments.

Their mis­sion is to help inde­pen­dent busi­ness own­ers achieve incred­i­ble suc­cess by reduc­ing the cost (and headaches) to cred­it card pro­cess­ing. When large banks/corporations pro­vid­ed cred­it card fees that were out of reach to most small busi­ness­es, Grav­i­ty stepped up to change the indus­try. They saw a need in the indus­try and firm­ly believed in giv­ing a voice to the lit­tle guy or gal!

Gravity’s mis­sion is linked to their cul­ture. Each employ­ee holds shared respon­si­bil­i­ty and every­one advo­cates to the brand’s core val­ues: cre­ative lead­er­ship, pas­sion for progress and responsibility.

After some inter­nal reflec­tion, Dan imple­ment­ed the $70,000 min­i­mum wage by reduc­ing his 1.1 mil­lion salary to the same. Peo­ple judged him — they thought it was a mar­ket­ing tac­tic. But this was derived from the val­ues his father taught him to respect — low pay­ing salaries are wrong and great work mer­its acknowl­edge­ment. His per­son­al val­ues cre­at­ed a shift inside his company’s cul­ture, not only did prof­its soar, employ­ee pro­duc­tiv­i­ty was ever-growing!

Find­ing val­ue in your employ­ees and entrust­ing them as brand ambas­sadors who share the same brand core val­ues, will attract oth­ers who feel the same — from oth­er employ­ees to con­sumers. Devel­op­ing a cul­ture and align­ing it with your brand val­ues will help you reach your ide­al clients. Remem­ber we can’t serve all, do all. Who does your com­pa­ny aim to serve?

7. Brand clarity 

Brand clar­i­ty is not just for a tar­get­ed reach. If your employ­ees, part­ners, con­trac­tors don’t believe in your mis­sion you may need to define your brand clar­i­ty. When the tough times hit, fol­low Jay Jay’s rejec­tion process and apply it to areas your brand may be lack­ing. Instead of dwelling on the neg­a­tives, use it to develop/refine a sol­id brand cul­ture. The results may sur­prise you. Wouldn’t you rather build a com­pa­ny with a strong cul­ture that yields more prof­its? Estab­lish­ing a min­i­mum wage may not be your thing, (we think its phe­nom­e­nal) instead find ways to align your com­pa­ny cul­ture to your brand.

Devel­op­ing a mem­o­rable brand goes beyond your val­ues, per­se­ver­ance and clar­i­ty. How you har­ness a visu­al rep­re­sen­ta­tion of them all is incred­i­bly impor­tant. Strate­gic design­ers aim to solve a prob­lem that could serve peo­ple. We have the abil­i­ty to human­ize the business/branding process, result­ing in an approach­able and mem­o­rable brand.

At Nicte Cre­ative Design, we believe in using design as a cat­a­lyst for pos­i­tive change. How do you envi­sion cre­at­ing a pos­i­tive change in your indus­try? We’d love to hear it! 

Oh, and if you are curi­ous to see some pho­tos of us at the Inc. 5000… enjoy!