Branding and intuition do go together, but separately. I would be remiss if I didn’t come out the gate and tell you the truth about your brand coach, their probably dealing with some version of imposter syndrome. I have noticed today’s branding coach that none of them have extensive experience in organizational branding. Most are not savvy in design and only create branding strategies based on perceived social media trends. Not to mention, today’s branding coach is more likely to have the language of a wellness coach or mindfulness coach than words that peak your interest when it comes to basic brand strategy. But here’s the thing: mindfulness will not get you a return on your investment with them or take you directly to your target market.  

Branding strategy has to stay where it belongs because blurring the intuitive lines creates problems for you and how you perceive your business and friction with your hired branding coach.

Three ways branding coaches go wrong in general:

1. Trying to create a vision for you. Look, you don’t have a vision for your business and understand who you want to work for and collaborate with, then you should spend more time considering that before you hire a branding coach. 

2. Force mindfulness down your throat. They do this because attracting clients to your business doesn’t have much to do with how clean your strategy is. Selling anything is all about whether or not a person likes you enough to buy into what you could offer them. More likely than not, you are more interested in the lifestyle your hired branding coach presents than the work you will need to do to get your business into a good flow.

3. Assign tasks that you aren’t able to execute. Sometimes your confidence isn’t there for all the ways they expect you to show up on social media; this is part of why they stuff you with the wellness coach jargon and offer you affirmations and give you the fundamentals on the law of attraction. Also, you cannot execute these tasks because they are not aligned with you as an individual in terms of your most potent creative abilities nor your vision for your business. 

In my experience, branding strategy for entrepreneurs and creatives tends to be very generic. Branding coaches want you to get clear on your offers, price them according to industry-standard (but they will say they want you to charge your worth), they will promise to get you paid for talks, and land you on podcasts that will generate organic traffic. Sound familiar?  

As an empath and an intuitive coach, I’m all for others that want to help raise the vibration of this unforgiving planet on which we reside. But, the downside to this is that by the time most creatives and entrepreneurs hire a personal branding coach, they are desperate for actual results that relate to more clients and money. The average branding investment that will get you humming with a solid plan is $2500-$5000. You shouldn’t invest that type of money for affirmations that you could Google and quotes from books that are already in the dark corner of your office. 

When you invest in a branding coach, and you leave it all up to them, your voice gets lost in the process. Ultimately you need to be the energetic force driving your creative abilities to the forefront. Branding coaches are only concerned with mission, legacy, goals, but that has nothing to do with your divine designation. Honestly, it doesn’t matter to them whether or not you are good at what you do or if you are comfortable performing at the level they seek their strategic plan. Branding coaches are looking to you for income and more social proof of their success. And, that’s okay; we are all in our respective careers to achieve our personal goals and maintain our desired standard of living. However, such gross misalignment in seeking a brand coach and getting a wanna-be charlatan is nothing more than a regular old scam. 

I have had more than my fair share of personal interactions with brand coaches from all walks of life. Once upon a time, I even had an intuitive residency at a small branding firm. More recently, I was fed up with the need to be visible on social media and thought a bit of strategy would be appropriate and wise for me to unburden myself where I lack social strategy. My takeaway is something I had seen from afar before. Someone with minimal experience desiring to take the reigns of my entire business without deeply understanding who I was, my why, or connecting with what would work for me and my personality and the services I offer. Branding coaches have a script. It would be best if you were clear on that. The average coach has a formula for getting you results without considering your emotional landscape, deepest desires, and limitations. Everything about personal brand coaching is screaming quick fix, and when the results do not flow in, it always goes back to the strategic plan and what you did not do. It never amounts to them not having the skill set or the deeper connection into understanding you or your brand.   

Investment in an actual intuitive coach will help you clarify your specific energetic roadblocks and understand what creative abilities you have that align with your business and your soul purpose. In intuitive coaching, you have the opportunity to experience true clarity and an energetic shift that is authentic. More importantly, you can enter the coaching process with an expectation to discover more about yourself and any business or creative pursuit from the soul level and not as an afterthought when you run into issues with strategy. 

If you are looking to learn more about utilizing intuition as strategy for your personal brand or your creative team, schedule a discovery session to learn more about my approach to intuitive guidance.