How to use your unique style to define your brand and stand out in a crowd

By now, I hope you’ve gotten the chance to read this article that I shared on the importance of defining your dreams. While you were filling out the free dream-building worksheet, I shared at the bottom of that post, I’m going to guess that you encountered a few moments of doubt, and maybe you even stopped filling it out all together. It wouldn’t be a Michelle blog post, if I didn’t include an inspirational quote, and this is one we all need to be reminded of, over and over again:

“Doubt kills more dreams than failure ever will.” – Suzy Kassem

Answering to doubt
When you were filling out your dream building worksheet, maybe you did come up with a totally awesome idea for your business and then thought to yourself, “wait…somebody is already doing that.” I’m going to burst your bubble for a second. Most of the good ideas are already taken, but there’s always a way to do something new and innovative and different. Take the telephone for example. Everyone was pretty satisfied with the telephone as a product— but Apple didn’t let that stop them from coming up with the iPhone.

There are two ways to take one of your ideas, even if it’s already been done before, and make it successful:

1. Do it differently.
2. Make it better.

Rethinking competition
In the creative space, we are up against some really awesomely talented people who have no shortage of good ideas. It’s really easy to be intimidated. When I first started my business I would avoid creating certain types of designs because I was so afraid somebody was going to think I was copying them. What I should have been doing was taking scope of what others were doing, and putting my own spin on them, doing it differently and doing it better.

Each one of us is totally unique, and we need to use that to our advantage. Think of the travel journal example I gave in this blog post. Let’s say that there are two people who want to pursue a business creating and selling travel journals. Both can exist, and be successful, at the same time, just by taking different approaches. Take this for example:

Business A: Has a passion for history and family geneology. Their journals focus on traveling through and exploring the places where their families once lived, finding stories and facts along the way.

Business B: Is all about living life on a budget. Their travel journal injects tips and tricks for travelers to save money in each city that they visit. It also provides a place for the journal-writers to record new ways that they have learned to save along their journey.

Defining your unique angle
Over the next few days, I’d like to invite you to do some soul-searching on what makes you unique and what you can share with our world. Here are ten questions to get you started:

• Where have I lived, or where do I live, or where do you WANT to live?
• What do I value?
• What are my hobbies?
• What do people say about my disposition and personality?
• What are my talents?
• What brings me the most joy?
• Which style appeals to me most?
• What experiences have I had that have defined who I am today?
• What do I look like? (you’re only allowed to name the good stuff, here!)
• Who are the people that I spend the most time with?

There may be another person out there who has red hair and enjoys horseback riding. But probably not as many who have red hair, rides horses, and is a math whiz with an addiction to espresso. And who have their own business. It is this unique combination that is going to define your brand, and allow you to stand out from other designers who are doing the same thing as you. I promise you, there’s a market out there for exactly what you have to offer— it’s just a matter of creating that connection.

Using the questions above, outline some ideas you can use to inject your personality into your business. In a nutshell, how can you make your business more “you”? The goal here isn’t to try to figure out what people want you to be like and change yourself and your business to suit their needs. You can much better serve others by offering them what you do best…being yourself!

Eyes on your own paper
I’m going to leave you with this printable quote that I shared with my readers earlier this year. Print it out, hang it up, and keep that message in mind every time you second guess what you have to offer!  

{ Download your free printable here }