Find Your Core

Identifying and conveying the heart and soul of your small business is critical to the success of your social media strategy. Author and social media guru, Jay Baer calls this your “One Thing.” Identify your “One Thing” and it will affect every content and posting decision you make. In Social Media Examiner’s blog, Amy Porterfield highlights Jay’s approach. With some easily recognized examples, mixed with two examples of small businesses with which I have been working, here is how we find the heart and soul of your brand.

Take off your marketing hat and ask yourself, what does my business actually do? What is at the core? If you have initiated a social media strategy and begun to build a fan base, it is important to ask yourself, what do my fans say when they are happy? The answers to these questions bring you to your “One Thing.”

Jay’s examples of the “One Thing” include Disney = magic and Apple = innovation. Your goal is to make the same simple equation for your small business.

Pipal Leaf Yoga Studio competes with a number of yoga studios as well as health clubs offering yoga, not to mention the other types of exercise which also appeal to the yoga crowd. What does Pipal Leaf Yoga actually do? It offers authentic yoga without heat and hype. The fundamental principles of yoga practice are at its core, rather than weight loss. The combined health of mind, body and spirit surround the core.

The architect who has hung his own shingle simply identifies his core as the design of buildings. He has other initiatives such as sustainability, value and timeliness. But his “One Thing” is simply, building design.

Take this “One Thing” and make it the voice of your strategy across every network.

Pipal Leaf Yoga can post content defending yoga when the practice is criticized in mainstream publications by steering the conversation back to the healing nature of a practice performed correctly – aimed at the health of the whole person. She can broaden her content beyond yoga by speaking to her audience’s soft spots with organic recipes, book and music recommendations, and a variety of topics such as how our bodies and spirits are affected by the phases of the moon. 

The architect can engage his audience by posting beautiful photos of buildings he admires but had nothing to do with, and support them with content on how those beautiful designs influence his daily work. He can blog about local legislation and its impact on the future architectural make-up of the town.

It all comes back the core - the heart and soul of your business.

Have you defined your small business’ core? How do you apply it in your content?