Written by
Nahim Ali
How important is brand in SMP? Should artists be focusing on their brand? Do clients care? This is a question that is asked all the time. And the answer is, it kind of depends. But for the vast majority of artists, brand is something that they really should have at the forefront of their mind.
Is the client solely concerned with the individual artist, their individual portfolio, their history, their relationship with that artist, the communication they’ve had with that artist? Is it all centered around the artist or does the brands that they operate within, could be their own company, could be a larger company that they work for, how much of a role does the strength of that brand play in that decision-making process?
So over time, brand is definitely becoming more important and we’re seeing the evidence of this all the time.
It’s getting harder to differentiate artists from each other. More and more artists are becoming great artists. Therefore, the client is actually more likely now to get a great result. And they’re becoming a little less worried, a little less concerned because there is great work everywhere. In most American, UK, Australia, and European cities now, you will find at least one artist who could be defined as world-class. And that’s a really great thing for our industry, but it makes it difficult for those artists to differentiate themselves because the chances are there are other people that they’re competing with that are at the same level as they are.
Well, sometimes it will be about the individual relationship that they’re able to build with that particular artist. Sometimes it will be down to the level of service that that artist provides. Maybe they’ve just been quicker at responding to messages, answering the phone, maybe they’ve been a bit more friendly. Maybe the client has just warmed to a particular artist because they’ve had a meshing of personalities.
All of those things do play a role, as do things like price and location and so on and so forth. And of course, availability. But a major part of that decision-making process is down to the brand that that artist operates within.
If you have two artists where everything is equal, they both do great work, their pricing is about the same, they’re both just as convenient to get to, the client has been able to have great communication with both of them, and they’re deciding which way to go. And we see this all the time in the groups, the forums, the Reddits, and so on. People sitting on the fence between two artists. The brand is often the great differentiator that determines which artist gets the business.
Every SMP artist should be focused on brand because it plays a major role in the number of inquiries that you receive and also the conversion rate of those inquiries. It can be difficult to establish what your hidden conversion rate is. That’s the number of people that find you on social media or find you via your website or on Google Maps and then make a decision to contact you. It’s really hard to figure out that number, but that number is heavily influenced by the strength of your brand.
The first thing you have to do is figure out what you want your brand to look like, feel like, and what kind of personality you want it to have, because every brand needs a personality.
In New York City, you’ve got two very, very successful businesses. You’ve got Scalp Micro USA, which is run by Matt Iulo, and then you’ve got Gerow Hair Ink, which is run by John Gerow and Erik Roberto. And both of those businesses are successful in New York City, but they have very, very different brand personas.
Scalp Micro USA is very professional, very clinical and likes to inject some fun into the brand from time to time. And Scalp Micro USA do a great job of that. They’re very authoritative, they’re very trusted, they’re very well established. They don’t do anything that’s too quirky and crazy because their whole brand ethos is around reliability and being steadfast. Whereas Gerow Hair Ink takes a very different approach. The brand is much more relaxed, more informal, it’s more aspirational, it’s more celebrity-driven, and you can see that in the way that they approach their marketing with the number of celebrity clients that they’ve had. They make SMP cool and vibrant and fun and sexy and aspirational.
Now, both those businesses approach it in a very different way, but they both deliver great results. And the reality is that some people in New York will gravitate to one of those companies and the other will gravitate towards the other company. And largely that’s going to be because one of those brands they are simply going to be able to relate to better than the other.
And this is where you define your personality. There cannot be a mismatch between your personality as the owner of the business and the personality of the brand and the business that you represent. You simply cannot separate them because long term you simply won’t be able to keep that up.
If you run a company that has multiple people, it may well be that you define your brand personality around the people that are on that team. But the best way to do it, if you can, is to have that brand personality in place before you hire anybody. And then you hire people who are able to fit into that environment, who are able to complement the existing brand personality. At the end of the day, the brand is you, the business is you. And as time goes on, that may evolve as more people come into the business, but the foundations of that company will always be you and the brand message and the brand persona will always be you.
The personality of your brand determines how you communicate with the outside world, how they see you and what type of customers you attract. It determines what partnerships you broker. It determines your pricing. It determines your location, your service strategy. It determines absolutely every aspect of how you operate on a day-to-day basis. If your brand personality is very fun and very cool with a salon vibe, a tattoo vibe, a very artistic vibe, that there are going to be certain places that you want to put your brand in terms of how you promote it.
But there’s going to be other places that are maybe not quite right. It might be that LadBible is a great place to position that brand, but it might be that a medical journal might not be such a great place to position the brand.
It also determines how you structure the emails that you write, how you answer the phone, how you put together your social media content and what kind of vibe and feel that social media content has. It should determine whether your brand appears to be colourful and fresh and vibrant and in your face, or whether it’s more subdued and professional and medical feeling. Everything about your personality should reflect in your brand and that in turn determines how the brand presents itself to the world.
So you’ve established your brand personality. Great, you’re halfway there guys. The next thing that you need to do is make sure that all of your brand assets around the business are unified in line with that personality.
Your brand assets include your website, your Facebook page, your Instagram account, your TikTok or YouTube channel, the presentation of your clinic’s interior, it determines how available you are. So a very clinical brand isn’t necessarily going to be reachable via your personal WhatsApp number. However, a brand with a very chilled vibe may well enable direct communication between the client and the artist through WhatsApp, that everything has to align with this new personality that you’re creating.
So the next step is, to go through absolutely everything that you have within your business that the customer is exposed to, even down to your paperwork, your forms, the lighting inside your office, everything about your business that the customer sees, and make sure that it’s aligned with that brand personality. That may mean that you need to reconfigure your website, your social media channels, maybe have a think about how you advertise, but all of that is really important so that once that personality is decided, it’s properly reflected and people can see it, feel it, and touch it.
Okay guys, we’re nearly there. You’ve chosen the personality that your brand’s going to have and you’ve unified every aspect of your business, everything that’s visible to the customer, under that brand personality so everything just fits together.
Just like your personal reputation, your brand reputation is really important too. And it’s very easy to tarnish your brand with a few bad decisions. So you need to make sure that everything that you do, the way that your brand behaves, accurately reflects where your brand sits in the marketplace.
So for example, if your brand is positioned as a premium brand, if you are sending a message to your prospective customers that you are a premium business and they’re going to pay a premium and they’re going to have a premium experience, then you need to think twice about discounting your services. If on the other hand, the personality of your business is very casual, very laid back, very friendly and approachable and very informal, then maybe you might be a little bit more open to that type of thing.
You’ve also got to consider how you conduct yourself on social media. You know, we’ve all seen times where a business has lost its way and has had to suffer some heavy consequences as a result. People don’t forget very easily. And if you share something on social media, maybe it’s a political opinion or a worldview or something controversial, you’ve got to bear in mind that there may be people within your circle who are watching your business, who might be thinking of booking with you, who might take objection to what you’ve said. And it’s very, very hard to get those people back.
Now, I’m not saying try and be all things to all people. My business, Team Micro, certainly is not all things to all people. You either stand for something or you stand for nothing, and no one wants to be middle of the road. But you do have to be mindful of what you do on social media.
You know, after a few glasses of wine it’s not a great time to vent your spleen on social media using your personal accounts or your business account. Getting involved in arguments and fights with other artists is pretty ugly and people do it all the time and it’s human nature to a certain extent. When people have strong feelings about something, of course they want their opinion to be heard. But you must be really, really careful and remember that there is a time and a place to back off and just not get involved.
Everything that you do online represents your brand and your business. And you can damage your brand very, very quickly. Equally, if you conduct yourself in the right way, you can enhance your brand pretty quickly as well.
That’s all from me over and out. Don’t forget to follow us on our socials. If you have any questions or comments, if you have any feedback at all, if you agree, if you disagree, wherever you’re watching this video, please feel free to let us know. Leave a comment. We will do our best to reply.
