Rebecca Micciche // Crafting a Cohesive Brand

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Recap: 10/18/17

Hosted by LWD member Rebecca Micciche, Founder and Creative Director of Room Service Creative

Room Service Creative is a full-service creative agency specializing in branding, content creation, and branded environments. Recent work includes the design of the lobby in The Fair-Haired Dumbbell at the base of the Burnside Bridge and the branding and design of Second Profession Brewing Company in NE Portland. Room Service Creative takes pride in designing integrated brands for innovators.

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Topic: 

Rebecca discussed crafting a cohesive brand, focussing on how to design a social media content strategy that connects with your customers and supports your business goals.

She walked us through process steps to establishing your brand starting with a cohesive pie sectioned with Target Customer / Market Positioning / Archetype / Point of Differentiation.

Process Being:

  • Brand Story
    • What people connect to
  • Messaging
    • Communicated effectively & consistently across all touch points
  • Vision + Values
    • To give direction and build a strong culture
  • Purpose
    • To deliver genuine and distinct value to your customers

Rebecca’s unique background in film and copywriting has helped shaped the way she approaches building a brand story including the importance of Archetype.  She also explained how to separate “Personal Story” from “Business Story”.  When thinking about your business think from the position of what customers needs are and what your services are.  Choosing the right archetype match can really help your brand stick out.  This can also help you clarify what your niche might be and if there is room for your services.

12 Archetypes:

  • Sage – wisdom & intelligence
  • Innocent – faith & optimism
  • Regular “Gal” – empathy & lack of pretense
  • Ruler – responsibility & leadership
  • Explorer – autonomy & being true to ones’s soul
  • Lover – passion & commitment
  • Rebel – outrageous & radical freedom
  • Caregiver – nurture & support others / compassion & generosity
  • Creator – to create things of enduring value
  • Magician – finding win-win solutions & making the complex appear simple
  • Jester – to live in the moment with full enjoyment
  • Hero – expert mastery in a way that improves the world

We moved into talking about Strategies for Social Media and the formulas Room Service Creative uses to help their clients build purposeful, thoughtful content, while also using it as a tool to achieve your brand’s goals, reach potential customers, and build community and context around your brand.

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https://www.instagram.com/roomservicecreative/

Formula:

  • Education
    • What can my followers learn from me?
    • How does this lead to sales?
  • Inspiration
    • What can brighten my followers’ day?
    • How does this convert to a customer?
  • Behind the Scenes
    • What interests my followers about my business?
    • How does this inspire a purchase?
  • Community
    • What do I make my followers feel a part of?
    • How does this compel my followers to buy?
  • Think about the greater composition of the feed
  • Compelling grid
  • Consistency for brand
  • Composition of the shot

Rebecca shared some great tips for posting schedule of content creation.  Something she encourages her clients to do.

Example:

  • Mon – Culture
  • Tues – Product
  • Wed – Inspire
  • Thur – Product
  • Fri – Community

With the extra time Rebecca generously gave feedback to LWD members on their brand’s social media presence.

Some of those tips included:

  • Use better photography
  • Hashtags
    • Broad + Narrow –
      • Broad: have a high number of posts (example: #brass)
      • Narrow: have a low number of posts (example: #brassdetails) see below:Screen Shot 2017-10-30 at 9.15.32 PMScreen Shot 2017-10-30 at 9.15.07 PM
    • Hashtags related to items in the photo – for example #staghornfern that may be in background
    • Can have up to 30 hashtags
    • Use hashtags that your ideal customer may be searching for if the #’s relate to your products or services (example from Room Service Creative: #branddesign #creativebusiness #hospitalityindustry #architecturefirm are all tags our ideal client may search for).
  • Don’t post all your photos at once
  • Stagger photos, think about full composition
  • Respond to comments – build a community, genuine engagement
  • Copyright rules – you can not borrow images from others posts
  • Make sure your tagline says your services, what you do
  • Tell a story of your brand with images
  • Invite others to do “instagram takeover”, community through another persons point of view
  • Stay away from services that promise more followers, you want real engagement
  • Disengage outside apps that are connected to your instagram account
  • Switch to business account to have access to instagram analytics

Resources Mentioned:

– The Hero and The Outlaw – Building Extraordinary Brands Through the Power of Archetype By Margaret Mark

–Symbols, Images, and Codes By Pamela Jaye Smith