Live business identity audit

Hello. Hello, everyone. Thank you for being here. On what is possibly the hottest day of the year so far. And you could be outside in the sunshine eating ice cream.

So in light of that, I will do my best to make this as valuable as possible to reflect your attendance and time.

I thought that this would be an interesting topic, today, because when you think about, the marketplace generally, it’s noisy.

It’s getting noisier, and more and more, I think things like stepping into your authority, having a voice that people can trust, having a way to stand out is increasingly important.

So if you’ve not done anything like this, an audit of where you are, over the last six months, then you should find this valuable.

So, just to be clear, I’m assuming that everybody are business owners here? I think there’s nods all round. But you can use this type of process for personal brands.

And I’ve also used it in the context of leadership coaching. So helping leaders to develop their identity and to be clear about how they want to stand out.

So I’ve tailored today around business owners. But you can use it in other contexts too.

So it’s for you, if you’re one of those, which you are, which is good, but it’s also for you if you’ve ever asked yourself this question, because, every human I know, has. So double checking there’s no aliens here.

The reason for that is that we’re social animals and we need other humans to survive. So if you think of, you know, way back when you were at school, you got graded, you create your sense of identity by comparing yourself to others and what they think of you.

You know, you’re an A at maths or a B at sport or a C at sport and your best friends this and this and this. So we create our sense of identity by comparison, by reference points with other people, and that’s all really normal and fine.

And it’s a great thing to do, to check, well, what do people really think of me because it helps us develop our sense of self.

However, I’ve also seen this question get in the way a lot of people, when they’re building their brand or business.

And that’s the nub of what we’re going to talk about a bit today to get clarity around that, because there’s a couple of reasons why. Number one, is it’s unknown.

And in our in our chimp brains, unknown is scary.

If we stand out, if we put our head above the parapet, if we say, look at me, we might get eaten by a tiger or equivalent.

So it’s really normal for us to question that and for it to create some fear at a subconscious level, that can take over and start to run the show.

And the other reason that it can cause a problem when building your brand and business is people tend to forget to ask the other side of the coin, which is this, what do I think of me?

We don’t often stop to ask that and stand and reflect, do we? So today is a bit of an opportunity to do that as well. And we’re going to ask both of those questions, and find out the answers.

Because there’s nothing worse than not knowing, being stuck, second guessing yourself, doubting, doing all the things that it’s really easy to fall in the trap of doing as a business owner in one’s own bubble, and then not moving forward.

So today is an opportunity to answer those questions. We’re going to buddy up, and ask other people as well and start to get to the bottom of it and, and walk away with more clarity.

What we’re not doing today, just in case, just to clarify, is we’re not looking at logos, fonts, colours.

If you saw today, and it said something about stand out brand and people tend to think of brand as visual identity.

So what do I look like? We’re not talking about that today. We’re not talking about brand as in visibility, so how do I get a gazillion followers on, LinkedIn or wherever else, those parts are relevant of building a brand, but that’s not what we’re focusing on today.

And also just to reassure you, the thing that comes up the most is people worry about looking self-absorbed.

They worry about looking, you know, look at me, and nobody, nobody wants to feel like that. So it’s not about that either. But what it is about, is the stories that we create and tell.

Now, I break this down into two types of stories. That’s your Outside Story and your Inside Story.

Now, before we go into the actual audit itself, I’m going to just show you a little bit more about what I mean when I talk about Outside and Inside Story.

So, bizarrely, that’s changed my font into italics, but who knows? Who knows why?

Good job we’re not talking about logos and fonts hey. Never mind.

So as you read this about me, you’re going to start to make your, opinions, thoughts, perceptions of, do I trust this person?

Do I think she’s credible? Is she relevant to me? Do I like her? All of those things, you’re going to start to build your brand,
well, my brand as it lives in your head.

So your shortcut to thinking of who is Val and, is she relevant to me? That’s what brands are all about because brands are really what others think, what others think about us.

So that’s, I could say that’s my Outside Story. That’s the stuff that you tell people about who you are, about why you’re valuable to them, about why you deserve a little memory in their brain.

Oh yeah, this brand is relevant. Okay. And you create that through the things like what you stand for, how well you understand those clients.

If you’ve got a particular IP or a model or framework that that’s the way you work and you take people through, that might come into your Outside Story.

So there’s a whole load of ingredients that you can dip in to, to create your Outside Story.

But I could have showed you this side. And this is a little bit about my Inside Story as I’ve gone on the business entrepreneurial journey.

So when I first started out, I massively struggled to promote myself. I really struggled with imposter syndrome. I thought, you know, what are my peers going to think if I post on LinkedIn?

And I was scared of my own story, and that is the Inside Story . It’s the stuff that stops you from showing up and owning what you want to own in terms of that authority piece.

And it often comes out in things like underpricing, things like not showing up because you’re worried about what people might say or not wanting to sell because you don’t want to be seen as sleazy.

There’s a whole load of parts of the business journey that are Inside Story actually can quite easily take over the show.

Now for me, in my journey, I decided at one point, right, I’ve had enough, I felt my own limitations and I thought, I can’t do this anymore, and so I pitched to tell my story on a TedX stage about where I came from and why I’ve been rejected from a young age.

If you want to hear about that, you’ll have to go and watch the talks. We don’t have time today.

But the point is, it was a really scary process, not just standing in front of people, talking to them, but because actually, I was telling a story that my chimp brain was freaking out and I had to go through a whole load of, learning to work with my mind, learning to overcome those fears and that noise, in order to get to the place where I could do that.

And those learnings really bring me to what I now teach today, which is you can’t create an identity, what others think of you, unless you’ve got clarity, and you can control the narrative of your inside and Outside Story.

So how do we do that? How do we control the narrative?

Well, it starts with awareness. Once we are aware of our gaps, once we are aware of what those stories are, we can start to take back control.

And that’s really the gift of today is, and this audit, is an opportunity to start to develop more awareness around where you are now, what those gaps are and what potentially might help in terms of your next steps.

So in terms of the audit, what we’re going to be doing is, we’re going to be looking at the gaps that could be damaging your authority from an inside and outside perspective.

We’ll take a little bit of time just to reflect on what could be good next steps for you, and you will walk away with your top three priorities to help enhance and build your, more around your business identity fast.

Audit: Outside Story

Okay, so what I’d like you to do is also choose a profile, whether that’s your website, your LinkedIn, something that you think actually I’m going to just use this as a reference point of somewhere that I’m presenting myself, and I want people to be able to understand me. I want people to be able to get what I’m about.

Okay, so the first section you’ll see on the sheet that you’re on now there’s three sections value, difference and authority. And I just want you to focus on value for the first thing and give yourself on the first tab a score for those statements that you can see under value.

So this is about looking at who, what you do, how clear you are about what you do, who you help and where you’re taking your clients in terms of the transformation, the service, the delivery, what they get. So if you have a look at whichever your, thing is that your reviewing, your LinkedIn profile or your website, make sure you’re doing it in light of that, not just the things in your head, but actually what you’ve said.

Give yourself a score from 1 to 5 of how well you think you communicate those things in terms of those statements.

For those of you that are whizzing ahead, you can move on to the difference section if you like. So you’ll see again on each spreadsheet, you’ll have a section that’s about some of the things that can help you to articulate your difference. And again, on the buddy sheet you’ll have some statements to look at for your buddy’s difference, and how much you do or don’t agree with those statements.

And then thirdly, when you’ve done difference, you don’t need to rush, but, why should we believe you? So what’s your authority positioning? and that means, you know, actually is it about number of years experience? Is it about results you’ve got for clients? Is it about awards or accreditations, or is it because you’re published in certain places?

As you’re reading both yourself and your buddy’s profile, are you convinced? Do you go, yeah, give you my money. That’s what we’re looking for. So again, you’ll see a set of statements under the authority markers for both yourself and your buddy to give yourself scores on.

Audit: Inside Story

Okay, you can obviously carry on swapping scores later and chatting things through in as much or a little detail as you like, but we’re going to do a little bit on Inside Story now.

So on the third tab you will find the same three categories, and some statements just to reflect on yourself on how much is my Inside Story impacting value, difference and authority, those areas of my position of identity.

So value often comes out around feeling unconfident about sales, and also around appreciating the value and the impact of what you do for someone else.

So actually, to you, it might just be a website to someone else it’s like, actually that means I can launch my business or whatever it might be. So it’s understanding the value you bring.

The difference is being really clear about you being really grounded about, this is what I stand for, these are my values. This is you know, we often as, you know, multi passionate people, I know there’s a lot of that in the creative world.

We want to be everyone to everyone. We want to help everyone, certain you get that a lot in the coaching world. But we can’t necessarily be everything to everyone.

So being clear on our difference and being clear about who we’re best placed to help and get the best results for is important. And also recognising the value of your story and your experience and how you’ve got to where you’ve got to today and why that could be relevant to your ideal client and what you bring in terms of the difference you bring.

And then finally, the authority piece in terms of that Inside Story , as mentioned, it can show up in terms of not wanting to put yourself out there, wanting to be seen as, boastful and then, you know, it’s very it’s very often British, isn’t it, to downplay our expertise.

You know, we don’t want to be seen to be blowing our own trumpet.

But, you know, we do have to, to a certain extent, actually own our expertise and own authority, and that’s important as business owners or any brand, any brand, whether that’s a personal brand or leadership brand and of course, imposter and comparisonitis can play a massive part as well in terms of we can’t step into our own sense of authority, if we’re struggling and battling those things.

So just take a few moments to reflect on how your Inside Story ’s doing and how that may be impacting your Outside Story.

Audit: Business Identity Score

Okay, so, when you’ve done that, you should then be able to go to the last spreadsheet on there, which should give you your business identity scores. And it should have magically totaled them up for you in terms of your Inside Story and Outside Story. Spreadsheet 4, at the top. So if I’ve done my maths right, I can’t promise that.

If your total is between 18 and 54, we’ve got quite a lot to work on.

If you’re between 55 and 90, you know, in the second half of the trajectory. So it just gives you a sense of where you are. You can obviously break that down more.

And as you go through your scores, if you’ve got actually areas that are less than three, you know there’s obviously a lot more work to do in those areas.

Then there is the strengths that you feel above three that you, you know, you feel smug about those ones, right?

So just take a moment now to look over those scores and I just want you to reflect on, okay, where are the top three areas that maybe I need to focus next, inside or Outside Story in terms of your scores.

So my connection story often I use you know, I felt this I felt this when I first started in my business. I struggled to promote myself, and then I did this and actually, I understand this isn’t easy. I understand this isn’t straightforward to do, to develop your own identity.

That’s one that I use as an example, which shows how your experience or experiences link.

So in terms of your top three, now we’re just going to take a few moments to reflect on actually what we want to do with what we’ve learned today.

It’s all very good isn’t it, having awareness. If we don’t take action, we’ve wasted 45 minutes, which we don’t want to do. So, what is a coach if they don’t make you take action?

So we’re just going to take a few moments to reflect on these questions in relation to those top three. Maybe just start with one and you can always carry on this afternoon if you want to spend a bit more time on this.

Everyone’s taking pictures, it’s a good sign. So what we want to be thinking about, well, what’s really going on here?

So you mentioned, actually, I can’t fix this right now, it’s not a quick fix, and that might be the case.

It might be if you’re a new business or you’re going through a transition you haven’t done the ideal client research, you’re still understanding what’s working and what’s not. You can’t nail that down yet or you’re in the process of it.

So we know that. So actually we’re already working on it. Or if it’s a mindset piece I’m not showing up.

What’s really going on here is I’m worried about X, Y, Z or someone thinking this or I haven’t got anything to say or, so the first step is what’s really going on here in terms of this score.

Why is it low and making sure you understand that. The next thing is, well, what would make it a five if it was to be the best it could be?

What would be different now to what is? So actually, I would feel like this, I would feel amazing, I would be really confident in what I’ve got to say, or I absolutely have my ideal client nailed and I’d know this, this and this about them.

What would actually make that five? Why does that matter? So let’s get really clear about why we’re even bothering.

So, you know, usually in business it’s about, well, it helps you to make money, but it might also be it for the Inside Story about, well, actually it makes me feel good about it, and if you don’t feel good about what you’re talking about, you’re not going to talk about it, then you’re not going to promote your business or anything else.

And that’s the end of that, I’m going to go home. So get really clear about that. And then, how could you increase your score by one in the next 30 days?

So, research shows particularly in coaching, if you get really specific about what action you’re going to do, put it in your diary, you’re way more likely to do it.

So if you were to take one of those and say, how could I increase my score by one in the next 30 days?

Give yourself an action to go away from here with that, and then finally get really clear about what support you need.

So whether that’s, you know, I need to do some more ideal client research. I need to go and ask ten more people what they think about my website and what they think about CoWork Club or whatever it might be, what support do I need? What do I need to do?

I won’t make you sit and do them now. But you can obviously do them this afternoon if you want to. And then finally an invitation. So I’m going to be here all afternoon, and I will be running my own little identity clinic over here if you want to come and, I just made up that brand.

If you want to come and chat about anything you found out. If you want to just come and bash some ideas around, obviously, I’m sure some of you will carry on chatting about your scores because I know you’re in deep conversations anyway, but, you can come and do that and have a chat with me.

And everything we’ve done today is based on my Story Masters Method, which is the framework I use.

So whether I’m working with a business or whether I’m working with an individual, it’s about helping them to understand their value and their identity, what value they bring, helping them to then build absolute confidence, to be able to own that value, and then to be able to communicate that, to get the impact and success that they want. So their next role or a big client or x, y, z.

So thank you very much.