For anyone who has had that eureka moment, the process of turning a great idea into a successful business will eventually require some attention to marketing. It’s easy to get the marketing part wrong during the startup process. Here are some of the pitfalls to beware of.
Establishing credibility is the main reason for every startup company to consider getting a logo (or “corporate identity”, as designers call them) and some communications materials. However, many fail to appreciate why credibility is so crucial in the first few months. It is not uncommon to hear a company founder make one or more of the following statements:
- we can’t afford it;
- we have no product to sell yet;
- we haven’t developed a sales strategy yet; or
- we are in stealth mode
The above may be true, but it doesn’t negate the need for a company brand. While not being noticed by competitors may be important, an outwardly professional appearance is always essential because a lack of branding may hold you back once you start looking for investors and employees.
Many people will be casting a critical eye over the company. They could regard the lack of branding as the telltale sign your company doesn’t understand marketing.
Consider this: when successful entrepreneurs decide to start their second or third company, they nearly always create their brand first. And they will enlist the help of graphic design professionals almost from day 1.
The startup process can be a challenging time for any entrepreneur and sometimes there is a temptation to use a temporary solution for certain needs. The corporate identity often falls victim to this approach.
Going through a branding process requires a commitment of time and money. However, using a temporary corporate identity often leads to a compromised or confusing brand. If you haven’t taken the time to think about what your identity needs to convey, your temporary solution may not accurately represent your brand.
The danger is that temporary has a nasty habit of becoming permanent. Once you have been using a corporate identity for a while it will gather recognition, even if it says the wrong thing about your company. Ideally you want your corporate identity to offer increasing value over time as it develops into a valuable business asset.
A recent survey of Canadian graphic designers found that the average fee for a stand-alone corporate identity was $5,620. And although 12% of Canadian designers will charge more than $10,000, this is still a relatively small cost when pro-rated over the lifetime of a company.
Many people have an artistic side and graphic design is an alluring activity. It is this appeal that encourages some novices to spend an evening or two at the computer creating their own logo and marketing materials. However this homemade approach will not cut if you are looking for serious investors and high-quality employees. There is no substitute for the professional approach.
When budgets are limited, it is far better to get a few things done very well, rather than trying to get many things done in a mediocre fashion.
When you first start talking to a graphic design firm, beware of any kind of specially priced “startup package” that throws in a bunch of deliverables for free (or at little additional cost). You may have to live with your business card, letterhead, website, brochure, display or packaging for quite a while, so if you don’t need everything right away, obtain the best results with your limited budget by focusing on the essentials first.
Meeting your first potential investor may be the defining moment of your entrepreneurial career. It is advisable that you go armed with the basic items of a well-branded company. At minimum, your new corporate identity should be displayed on a professionally designed business card that uses a good-quality card stock and has been printed using an offset printing process.
The same goes for your marketing documents. No investor will expect you to have lavished money on a slick marketing brochure. But documents that have been printed on high-quality letterhead and packaged inside a professionally produced presentation folder will send the message that your company is capable of developing a professional and confident long-term brand once it is suitably funded.
For all startups, there is a crucial need at inception to be able to communicate the value of the company in a concise and compelling way. A carefully crafted elevator pitch can magically open doors, so think about your message and take the time to craft it into a concise and convincing story that is relevant to your audience. Don’t fall into the trap of winging it or assuming you’ll know what to say when someone asks.