Jump-Starting Brands

For over twenty something years I've been a hired gun to help companies create and build brands, which is great fun. And yes, while I've been on the executive team in many cases, I rarely shared the risk and liability of the owners' circle.

So let's change that. I'm a serial entrepreneur and every ten years or so I get bit by the start-up bug. What starts as an idea, quickly moves in to a new venture.

In this month's column, I'm going to start a series of articles sharing with you the play-by-play experiences of a start-up brand. They may not be consecutive. Because I will only dedicate a column when I believe there is worthy content for you. I'll cover candid missteps and meaningful insight. Hopefully you can apply these real world pearls to your situation and reduce your new crop of gray hair.

How a start up starts

Our concept was birthed during a work/play excursion to New York City with my colleague Jocelyn in December, while splitting an incredible piece of flourless, dark chocolate cake and drinking a fine cabernet at Nolita House. Nolita House is a campy joint that feels like a schoolhouse -- you can write on the walls, misbehave and drink good vino, nosh on sweet stuff and cook up big ideas.

After the second glass of wine came our epiphany: how cool would it be to have a community for people like us -- smart, fun, brave, always curious and a bit odd -- where you could express yourself, get inspired, find uncommonly cool things, resources and content, and meet others?

From that day our ideas scribbled on a white bev napkin, came to be our new obsession. In early January we filed the legal docs, structured the ownership and Oddpodz became an official start-up.

So what was an Oddpodz and how would our pile of crazy ideas turn into a successful business.

Lesson 1- Do something you love and do it with someone you trust

Jocelyn and I have worked together for over two years on branding projects. She came from investment banking and was a 20-year branding guru. We were two different, but complimentary peas in a pod and shared the same work ethic -- stay paranoid, think big and work like a smart dog.

This is where the serious brand planning started. We listed what was important to us. Both partners believed if you don't love what you do, it's not worth doing.

So what did we want to get from our efforts? Was it money? Was it pleasure? Was it more freedom? Power? Maybe it was a little of all of them.

From here, we needed to figure out what the market was hungry for, and what would be a sustainable business model.

Lesson 2- Do something you understand

Our gut feeling was to build a community like myspace, but focus on a more narrow and defined group of people. Instead of a space for everyone, be a relevant space that appeals to like-humans and humans like us, the creative class. And then from there we'd build extensions of products and services.

With our general direction in place we started an intensive research program. We studied other communities, the creative class sector, information trends, consumption patterns and what the investment market was interested in seeding. We bought reports, we conducted focus studies, we talked to a lot of people and asked a lot of questions. We read hundred of articles and case studies on other related business successes. Early on we build databases journal our findings.

After a couple of months of research, we were convinced that our idea had legs. Especially when our left-brain friends heard about the Oddpodz idea and said, "I don't get it," we knew we were on to something big. Now we needed to document our mission, plan, and start protecting our ideas.

Lesson 3- Start with the end in mind

We capsulated our company vision in an executive summary. Which is usually the last part of a business plan. However, we believed in order for one to achieve greatness, you must know in your mind what full success looks like before you achieve it. The executive summary was a work in progress document. It has changed many times and will likely continue to be modified. Our executive summary clearly defined the brand essence (our purpose, points of difference, personality and promise) the market opportunity, revenue streams, competitive landscape, and growth strategies.