If You Build Your Brand, Will They Come? Ask AIDA…

“Sometimes you can get a little too much sun, basking in the glory of building your brand. So much so, that you start hearing voices telling you “If you build it, they will come.” That line may have worked for Kevin Costner’s character in Field of Dreams, but advice like that can prove disastrous for a brand start-up. In this article Neil Osborne explains how great brands work a process to create both sales and success.

It’s got to be said. Field of Dreams lied to us.

Why? The voice that spoke to Ray Kinsella and told him to carve that dang baseball diamond from his head-high cornfield left something out. Yes, the tiny tidbit it missed was, “If you build it, they will come. But it’s gonna take some effort to get them here.”

In the movie, the ghosts of great players miraculously emerged from the cornfield to play ball on Ray’s field, but that sadly doesn’t happen in the salon marketplace. Your customers won’t appear out of thin air.

The truth is, today you can’t just sit back and wait … for things to happen.

Even though you may see yourself and your brand as visionary — along with movie-worthy intentions and dreams — it’s rare that your vision includes your brand being poised for success, with an audience bursting out of nowhere.

You need a process.

AIDA: Hit a home run

One of the oldest — and perhaps the most simplistic — founding principles used across both sales and marketing, is AIDA. By using it as a guiding rule in all your brand activities, you’ll develop effective communications that talk directly to your customers’ needs and desires, and provokes them into buying…”