The Brand & The Business Model

I am sure you would agree that people don’t often put ‘brand’ and ‘business model’ in the same sentence. While both are critical to the success of a company, they are often seen as different and separate. Does that make sense – especially in an era where vision, velocity and precision must go hand in hand? I think not.

Before you introduce marketing and sales best practices into a company, you need to FIRST transform the brand to the business model or the business model to the brand. Skipping this step wastes tremendous resources downstream — not to mention the loss of time in the marketplace.

Why do I say this?

Vision is execution done properly. A solid, powerful, even compelling vision is only as good as how well it’s executed. Before you engage best of breed capabilities on the execution side — publicity gurus, marketing program experts, sales effectiveness training, marketing benchmarks, creative talent, and the like — you must FIRST transform the brand to the business model or vice versa. Disregarding this imperative is not only wasteful in terms of money, it costs the company its most valuable asset – time in a fast-moving marketplace.

At the end of the day, it’s not about logos, thought leadership, catchy slogans, brand attributes, vision statements, product strategies, sales messaging or compensation programs, it’s about getting your market position and strategy aligned with your business position and strategy. It’s about setting up the brand and business model to reinforce and build off of each other. Only after this alignment is assured does it make sense to put your marketing, sales, and communications to work.

Thomas Butta