 today we're focusing on how to build a brand from scratch. This is going to be a seven part series because there's just too much for me to be able to get across. I don't just want to give you the what I want to give you the how as well and this brilliant question has come from Claire in Leeds. So Claire I'm going to read out your question and if you like Claire are also thinking about building your brand from scratch then over these next seven steps we're going to get really into how you can go away and do this for yourself. So Claire says Sammy I need your help. I get a few of those. I've been a coach and mentor for many years and I love the work that I do but I've been feeling a strong calling to support people in a bigger way by creating programs and courses that reach the masses. I have built my business through word of mouth referral and realised that I don't actually have a brand. Please tell me how to build a brand from scratch. Well here's what we're going to do over these next seven steps. This obviously being step one we're going to look at research and listening. We're going to look at how do you craft your offer. We're going to look at how do you pre-launch or other words soft launch the product. We're going to look at how do you then launch it. Once you've done the soft launch how do you go through that launch process. How do you then optimise the product or service that you're creating so that you can then re-launch it with feedback. So we're going to go into that. We're going to look at how do you go through the process of illuminating it and putting the spotlight onto the great work that you're doing. And then finally how do you automate that so that you don't have to go through this process again and again and again. And you are in luck because I literally launched the seven step brand Kickstarter system about two months ago which used to be for only my brand builders club members. I spent a month of my life just completely unpacking it and remaking it so that it would be available to the public. And the process I'm going to share with you is the exact process I used to create it. So Claire thank you so much for your question. I'm going to close that down now so that I can completely concentrate on you. And if you've got any questions as we go through this training please do pop them in the comments below. So the first part of this full process is about you going into the research and listening part. Now I know that research and listening can be very boring but it is the most critical part of this process because if you create things that people don't want to buy then you're just going to keep creating things and you've got more things but you've got no money in the bank that is in proportion to the energy that you're putting into creating these products and service. So the very first part of it is the listening, listening and research. I just love collecting problems and from now on and by the way you might want to make loads and loads of notes as you go through this process but some people use the comments to make their notes so you could do that and then come back later so you can listen to what I'm saying to you instead of focusing on writing lots and lots of notes. It depends how you want to do it but the key thing is that you really master the art of collecting problems. Yes you're a business owner, yes you're a marketer but yes you are also a problem collector because without those problems you've got nothing to solve. And the beautiful thing is for every problem you solve you create another problem. It's as simple as that so never ever get caught up in this drained thinking of oh but if I give it all away then they won't need to buy it from me it doesn't work like that anymore the more you give the more you receive the more you receive the more you can give that's definitely how I think anyway and certainly with the part of the one drop philosophy if for every little drop of hope or inspiration or support or service that you deliver to each person that you work with on the planet that creates another ripple and each ripple you create makes a wave and that wave becomes an ambassador for you that wave is then carried way beyond just that first customer. So I always think about whenever I work with somebody I'm focused on how can I give them such a brilliant experience that they become an ambassador for my business because it's going to make it a lot easier for me to build my business and that's a key element of thinking for you okay that's abundant thinking not lack thinking we're going into abundant thinking as we go through this process so let's think abundantly let's think about how can we solve as many problems as we possibly can so that we can get more and more people to live the life or the business or enjoy the health the wealth the whatever it is that you you do for your clients they're going to be able to find you and they're going to be able to start living in the way that they deserve to live because you showed up in their life and if there are other people that are out there in the world saying they do what they do and you could maybe think of several people you could probably call them to mind right now people who are out there who are charging more than you who are not giving their clients the the depth of service and the level of quality relationship and the level of integrity that you deliver well is there about time that you did isn't it about time they found you instead of them first so let's make that happen so here's a strategy that I use whenever I am going to launch a new product so the first thing I do is I go and I join five different groups now that can be on Facebook it can be linked in it could be forums it could be anywhere where your ideal customers are hanging out in massive volume yeah so we're not talking about going and finding a Facebook or LinkedIn group or a forum that has 100 people in it we're talking about go and find some groups and forums that have got thousands of people in there and thousands of them are people who would be perfect for your product or service so that's the first step is go and find five groups because not all of those groups don't think she's like oh my god then I've got five groups to manage you don't because ultimately the reason why you're going to join five is because you're going to find the top one or two maximum three that you need to be showing up in every day for you to start building really good brand credibility the more visible you are the more credible you become the more profitable well you'll follow that with right because the more visible you are the more chance you've got of building that quality relationship with a lot more people a lot faster and they then will go out into the world and tell other people about you so go and join those five groups when you get into those groups put a post in them just saying hello now what I tend to do is I find something an image that's a really bright color like bright pink or something that really stands out on the page so that everybody that's on that page that's the first thing they see and just put you know hi my name is I'm from you know so fill in the gap wherever you are in the world I'd love to know where you are where where are you in the world just ask something really simple like that because what that does is it doesn't create a barrier what it does is it's an open question that really opens it up and everybody knows where they live all right if you ask them to answer a really hard question then they're probably not going to answer that because they don't know how to answer it or they go into their perfectionist belief or their limiting beliefs that stop them from actively participating if you ask them where they live you're more likely to get that response I did this recently when I was launching the seven step brand Kickstarter and I went into five groups three of them became really really active I went in into one of them I posted hi my name's Sammy at the time I was in Manchester we live on a boat so we travel full time so I could be anywhere the next time I make videos for you I could be in a completely different location right so I said hi I'm Sammy I'm from Manchester or I'm currently in Manchester I'd love to know where in the world you're from you know pop it in the comments below let's see if I can let's see if we can say hi from wherever we are and I just put something like that just something really friendly I had over 350 comments within 24 hours because it was an active group and that's what you're looking at that's why you want thousands of people out of I think there was something like 30,000 people in the group so out of 30,000 people 350 of them came and said hello in 24 hours that's why you want a big group because there's going to be an active part of that group that that will respond and when they respond you need to make sure that you are following up on that so don't just put it in there like a grenade expect it to explode and then don't go back to it this is an opportunity for you to now really build your personal profile for you to leverage that credibility yeah because building trust the more people see you the more they see you showing up the more they trust you the more you open your mouth and you are talking sense the more credibility you build the more credibility you create the more connection you create the more connection more conversation they want to it starts more conversation you create more engagement when you've got more conversation that's when it leads to the conversion and that conversion is the stranger to a friend so that's where you want to definitely take your business is that conversion from a stranger to a friend and then a friend into a customer a customer into a lifetime customer we're going fast here so i hope that you're right and i can see there's smoke coming off the off the page or off your keyboard right now so that's where we want to get to you want to start to really build that relationship they come back you know and you might think oh god i've never heard of wherever that is in the world so say so say oh i've never heard of that place where somebody somewhere close that i would know just start that conversation start the conversation so that when you send a friend request or a message to them they're going to respond because they now feel like they know you and this is where you can start to then jump onto a message outside of that group and say hey i'd love to know more about what you're doing and you know i talk much faster than i can type why don't we jump on and have a virtual coffee and that's where you can start to build that conversation and that's where the conversion from stranger to friend happens and when you're on that call don't try and sell them on that call just really use it as a fact finding opportunity and if the worst thing that happens is that they go away with a really high perception of your brand that wow that was a really nice person they were the drop for me today like go into that conversation to give because the more you give the more you will receive go into it to give find out how you can support them and then there if they're the right kind of person if they've got the same kind of values issue they'll want to do the same for you if they don't do the same for you then i promise you even if you go out of your way to support them what the universe will do even if that person doesn't give it back to you the universe looks down on that and it says wow you gave a lot there we're going to give you a lot and it might not come from there but we're going to give it to you from here and here and here and here and you will be abundant in so many ways honestly it always comes back to you maybe you've experienced that before the problem with looking in the same direction that it's come from is that you end up getting so focused on that that you miss all of this magic that's also happening around you so so do watch out for the magic coming back to you and the more you meet with people the more questions you can ask the more research you're doing and something else that i did once i started to build those relationships because now i'd built some trust now i'd built some credibility after about three or four days it was time i was ready to then start asking the real questions so that's when i put a post out into this into the group and i said i've created a seven step system that and so i talked about the seven step brand kickstarter how it dramatically increases your the quality of conversions you come out with a 10 second 30 second and 60 second pitch you're raising your visibility getting massive exposure building up your products and services so there were lots of different things you know your vision and the values behind it your brand colors there was all kinds of stuff that i built into this seven step program so i put that into this post i said i'm looking for 21 people to test this product for me so i can build it around you and that way it will be perfect for everyone that goes through the program after that who would be interested who would be willing to go through that process and i got all these people that responded right and it was brilliant because they responded and that meant that i had people that i could test the the content with before i then went and did anything else the other thing that i did was i also because i did that and then i i used the groups to ask lots of questions and i asked things like you know i'm thinking of creating a webinar that will support you with how to build a brand what are some of the questions that you've got around how to build a brand so i can build that in and then i make it totally relevant for the audience and in one group i got about 21 questions in another group i got 19 questions in another group i i got 26 questions right and all of those questions i collected them some of them were the same so they were the ones that i answered first because there was clearly a theme and then i answered the other ones as well and the beautiful thing about doing that is that you can say just like i'm doing now hi claire thank you so much for your question on how to build a brand from scratch if you like claire have the question that's just like this then over this next 10 minutes we're going to answer that for you and if you've got any questions pop them in the comments below and i'll make you a video as well so here we go so you go on with the content you then post that content you tag claire in and you say claire are you send a little message claire i've just made you a video to answer your question it was such a good question i just felt it deserved a proper video answer i'd love and appreciate it if you could share this with all of your business friends as well because i think that my answers will help you and it will help them to really appreciate your support good luck and let me know how you're getting on well claire whoever i was making the videos for them was like oh my god you made a video just for me share share share share and it turned my brand into a very high visibility brand very quickly and i built a lot of quality relationships within those groups so i for in about an hour every day all i was doing was collecting problems and answering them collecting problems and answering them within 12 weeks of doing that when i launched how to build a brand i was bringing in 18 000 pounds a month because i built so much trust people were asking me about my programs i launched my first book the seven reasons why customers don't choose you and how you can change that and off the back of the book which all that book is doing is and you can see it just behind me in the middle there all that book is doing is answering questions i just took the top questions i was getting again and again and again and i answered them in that book and i turned it into a workbook so people could scribble in it and and really make it their brand building bible and then after that i created the first program the brand accelerator program and that was a significant program six months of me working one on one with the people going through that program i had 18 people join that program within 12 weeks of me starting the business and just all just did this strategy and so i created everything off the back of just asking questions and people were paying me a thousand pounds a month for six months to be a part of that program so i had 18 000 pounds of solid cash flow coming into the business and working with 18 people for one hour a month really was not a massive deal because i had a big program behind that and i developed that program around them now i mean that program that's now about eight years old just coming up to eight years old and in all honesty i had no idea that that program would become as big as it did because i was building it around each person that went through it so that anybody that went through it after that it would be easy and i could systemize it exactly this process i'm taking you through now but like if you look at that program now because i was building it around each person and it didn't feel like it was a big deal because i wasn't having to make a load of things in advance i was just responding to each person and the majority of the content was the same but there would be little tweaks if i had somebody who was in property for example well they needed some a few little extra different things than somebody who's a coach a mentor or somebody who was coming in and they wanted to build their brand as a public speaker they needed a few extra things as well and so each person that came through got to the point where i had something for each industry and when i look at my infusion soft and we'll talk about systems and things at the end of this process i use infusion soft and when i look at that now for that one program there's over 700 emails that are now programmed in for that program there's a what if they do it what if they don't what if they get halfway i mean the system is so intelligent that i'm able to literally manage each client now that goes through that process without me physically having to be there and i'm just on the other end by email which has saved in it just a magnificent amount of time than when you first create it so that's what you're going to do in this one with it's gone a little bit longer for this particular training session because we've talked you through what we're going to do and now this is the first step and there is actually a worksheet that i'm happy to give you it's something that i made for my brand builders club members about three or four months ago it's called how to get early adopters to buy your course your product or your program before you've even made it i won't charge you anything because i made it for my members anyway and just drop me an email at sammie at howtobildabrand.org that's sammie at howtobildabrand.org and and just put in the title at youtube early adopter so that i know that that's what you want and actually also ask me for the 25 questions as well because when you get to the point where you've got them on the phone you then want to have your questions ready so that you can ask them about what's going on in their life and how you can build this program around them how would they want you to do it do they prefer video do they prefer it written do they prefer to listen to it and there's loads and loads and loads of questions that i pulled together and turned into like 25 questions so before you jump on that call you're able to look down that list of questions or what i do is i copy and paste them out because i've got it in a word document i copy and paste out like the five or six questions that i'm going to answer them and and those questions might be different for each person they're actually really good questions for um podcast interviews and things like that as well so so ask me for that send me an email and ask me for that i'll be more than happy to send it to you because i think that's going to help you even better to go through this process and and do it in an even more concise way in a way that really works for you so do that research and join those five groups you could do that straight away you don't have to wait you and remember perfection is poverty perfection is paralysis if you start trying to make everything perfect then it's just never going to be perfect enough so just get shit done join those five groups go and say hello put that little post out there see what starts to happen for you and as you start giving you'll start receiving i guarantee you'll start receiving it might not be financial receiving at first but what happens is you create the domino effect the ripple effect those ripples start making waves and as soon as you make waves that's when you start to really get going so i hope that you have enjoyed this video and if you have then please make sure that you subscribe you know what to do subscribe and i would love it if you could share it with your your friends as well let them know how they can subscribe to the how to build a brand channel and i look forward to seeing you in part two of this episode so take care and i will see you there