Brand Warriors Have Courage, Skill & Fight

Fighting off the pirates trying to steal your customers is a full time, full contact sport. Your competitors will give you no quarter. Sitting on the sidelines, believing you can prevail and hoping for success will just not cut it.
 

In 2017, everyone in your organization and every one of your partners who touches a customer must become your brand's relentless champion.
 

But becoming your brand's champion is more than just an idea. It's more than a plan. It's more than a set of bullet points on a piece of paper. It's more than a meeting.
 

Here are the three essential qualities that you, your team and everyone who touches your business must find within themselves and bring to life on the battlefield that we call business.
 

Think of it as the spirit of the "Brand Warrior".
 

#1. The Brand Warrior has Courage
 

It's easy to be courageous when everything is certain. But can you embrace uncertainty? Can you ask the very difficult questions about who you are and what you are offering to customers?
 

Asking whether what you do has real meaning and value for your customers requires courage. Can you separate what you believe from what you know? Can you listen with clarity to the voice of your customers? Can you be an unrelenting advocate for your customer in the face of resistance from your own senior management?
 

#2. The Brand Warrior has Skill
 

The skill to ask the right questions in the right order is essential. But you also need the skill of patience.
 

Can you instill in your company the sometimes slow and steady discipline of teasing out exactly what you need to become to set yourself apart from the best of your competitors? Do you have the savvy and finesse to push back against a management team that wants a quicker fix and demands more immediate returns and results?
 

#3. The Brand Warrior has Fight
 

If it was easy someone would have already done it.
 

Are you willing to fight for the new way, the right way, a very different way to approach building your profitable and enduring brand? Do you have the fight to raise your voice, to take up the new banner and the new idea?
 

Are you willing to fight for your customer day in and day out? Can you keep up this fighting spirit at every turning point in your business?
 

Become a Warrior
 

Don't give up. Don't let discouragement stop you. Start with an unremitting belief in yourself and you'll turn it into a powerful and enduring reality that you, your company and your customers can know. Create something that you can defend and build on.
 

Begin now.