06/08/2025
~ Are you selling what you think you are? ~
I know, it’s a really weird question, but hear me out.
Several years ago, I was locked in a frustrating battle with our own brand. This was maybe fifteen or more years ago when the business was much younger and had a more generalised design offering. I was really struggling to articulate the value that we delivered, or what stood us apart. As a design business, I was convinced that it was our design style that made us unique… but even that didn’t feel quite right.
Then, a chance conversation offered up this nugget of gold: ‘the most valuable part of working with you wasn’t the brand design, but the confidence the design gave me’.
This changed everything and turned my perception of our business on its head. All of a sudden we were no longer trading logos and colour palette, but something far more powerful: we were trading confidence.
Confidence, I realised, was something every business owner craves, but few have. And it made for a far more compelling sales pitch – one that none of our competitors were trading on.
No longer was our sales pitch about how many logo variations we delivered – in fact, we barely spoke about design at all. Instead, it was about what the design enabled.
The lesson here was that our clear deliverable – design – was not our currency. It was something else completely.
I wonder what it is that you’re actually selling?
