The Sweet Success Of A Juicy Personal Brand

Boost Juice founder Janine Allis said that a personal brand was vital to the successful launch of her business. “Having a personal brand to help get the Boost brand out there was our total marketing strategy”.

Building a brand around her personal brand values meant that In the first five years of operation Boost Juice had 95% brand awareness, which, Allis said was ”extraordinary given we had zero money for marketing.”

The lesson for entrepreneurs who want to create big brands, for both themselves and their business, but don’t have big budgets is clear; building a personal branding can help your marketing pay for itself.

The juice queen however had some words of warning if you want to stand out as the brand champion for your business. 

Managing Your Personal Brand

You have to be conscious of the effect your personal brand has on your business brand.

Janine explained, “If I’m at an event, I have two alcoholic drinks and that’s it. I never drink and drive because how would that headline look for my brand? Imagine the headlines the next day… ‘Juice Lady On The Juice!”.

Her message is clear; be mindful of how your actions, behaviour, social media profile and personal standards can benefit or damage your business brand.

Of course this is a good thing for you and your business.

It keeps you personally accountable, after all, as Janine explained how her personal and business brands were inter-related, “Your personal brand gives you an obligation to your business brand, I can’t be 120 kilograms and unhealthy as the leader of this brand”.

The lesson here is to ensure your personal values and beliefs are carried over into your business brand, making it easy to maintain consistent messaging and helping your entire brand culture flourish.

It gives credence to the suggestion I make that you should ‘live your brand’.

On the other hand, vet turned business success and Janines fellow Shark Tank investor, Glen Richards said he purposely didn’t attach his personal brand to his business. because “It makes it too hard to sell”.

Your Brand And Your Business

Glen makes a great point here, and one I refer to regularly when I explain why businesses shouldn’t be branded using the founders name.

Even though there are many founders have done this, mostly in fashion, on-line marketing and entertainment; Versace, Russell Brunson, Oprah for example, although some like Ben & Jerry, are product based brands, there are limitations.

Until the business brand eclipses the personal brand (and this takes a very long time and massive budget) having your name front and centre makes it very difficult to leverage the time you spend in your business.

Basically your name has to become a noun or a verb to become a brand. It's called 'genericide' like, Jandals, or Frisbee.

Being separate from your business is especially vital for experts, mentors or coaches and consultants who tend to brand using their name.

Originally it seems a no-brainer to use your name, saving you time and money in brand name development, but soon it can make your life very difficult.

As Glen explained, “you want your business to be successful without you having to be there”.

The minute you use your name for your coaching business, everyone expects you to deliver everything.

Many have found that it works when you start out, but becomes increasingly restrictive as your business grows and you discover they cannot keep up supply with demand.

You Are Your Personal Brand

For a fresh take on the whole personal brand v business brand debate, startup success Steve Baxter clearly thought personal branding wasn’t important, stating “I don’t have one”, which is an interesting answer in itself.

Steve is known as a straight-talker who takes no prisoners in his role as a potential investor on Shark Tank, alongside Glen and Janine. 

Generally when I’ve heard him speak and experienced his personal brand on social media, its real, raw and bluntly to the point. 

To me Steve most definitely does have a strong personal brand and you’d expect any interaction with businesses he is part of would be clear cut, no nonsense (and those I know who work with him agree). It’s highly unlikely he’d have anything to do with a fussy brand.

Even without planning to, his personal brand shapes his decision making, filtering through into the business brands DNA.

The lesson here is that you may not even be aware that your personal brand is part of your business, but it shows. It’s up to you what you do with that, embrace it or ignore it, I suggest you leverage it!

What is the difference between a business brand and a personal brand?

Many entrepreneurs have asked me over the years about the difference between a personal brand and a business brand and hopefully these insights from there highly successful business leaders has clarified it for you.

In reality, the founders personal brand will infuse the business brand, infecting the culture and driving the communication style.

Whatever you do, just make sure you stay true to who you really are, not just as a business onswer, but also as a human being, so you can live your brand, making it easy to be well known, well paid and wanted.

Need to know more about how you can develop your stand out personal brand and infuse it into your business?

Get onto this FREE Personal Branding Starter Course from International Award-Winning branding specialist Lauren Clemett.