On this episode of Branded, Larry Roberts and Sara Lohse are going deeper than usual and talking about mind mapping.

By creating a visual outline of your areas of expertise, services, and unique selling propositions, you can organize your thoughts and gain clarity on what your brand offers.

We're talking about our own mind maps, how we created them, and walking you through the process. PLUS, you can find a template for creating your own mind map at bit.ly/BrandedMap.

1. Mind Mapping for Brand Clarity: The episode discusses the concept of mind mapping as a tool to bring clarity to one's brand. By visualizing and mapping out different areas of expertise and offerings, individuals and businesses can gain a clearer understanding of how their brand components relate to each other.

2. Diverse Skill Sets as Unique Selling Propositions: Having diverse skill sets and expertise can be reframed as unique selling propositions. By recognizing how different areas of expertise overlap and complement each other, individuals can leverage their diverse background to offer distinctive and valuable services.

3. Importance of Clarity in Brand Messaging: The conversation emphasizes the importance of clarity in brand messaging and the need for continuity and cohesion in presenting a brand's vision, mission, and deliverables. Developing a clear and cohesive brand message is essential for effectively communicating to potential clients and customers.

4. Visualization and Detailed Planning: The episode stresses the significance of visualizing and planning brand components in detail. By breaking down areas of expertise into subcomponents and further details, individuals can uncover connections between different aspects of their brand and identify how to harness their expertise to build compelling value propositions.

5. Action-Orientation and Continuous Improvement: We express the value of taking action to map out one's brand and continuously working on refining and evolving the brand components. Mind mapping is presented as a proactive exercise to help individuals identify areas for improvement and align their brand components for greater impact.

What is happening, everybody? I'm Larry Roberts. And I'm Sara

Lohse, and this is Branded, a comprehensive guide for Creative

branding. And on this episode of the podcast, we're gonna

be taking it a little deeper than normal. We're gonna be

thinking long and hard about this episode, and we're gonna be drawing

out a mind map. A what?

A mind map, Sara. It's a map of our mind.

No way. Way. So

No. You know, it's interesting because I I, you know, I belong to a

variety of masterminds, and I was in 1 a couple weeks ago.

And To be honest, I kinda got, I was in the hot seat, and

that seat got very, very hot because they were

talking about how I do so many different things, and I

cover so many different topics. They're like, dude, what do you

do? And it kinda left me stumped for a couple of

weeks, and, You know, we had the holiday there, so I had a lot

of downtime, a lot of thinking time, and,

I went and visited Another creator. His name's Roger Wakefield,

massive YouTuber. He's a plumber by profession,

and he just has an entire, like, media,

Compound out where I went. It's out here in North Texas. It's amazing,

but he also brings a lot to the table, and he talks about a variety

of topics. And it was just, like, it was fate

for me to go out there and visit him this past week because as soon

as I walked into his office, We had our little chitchat, and I sat

down. And he hands me this 8a half by 11 sheet of paper and

goes, bam, slams his hand down. He goes, this It's what I've been working

on, and it was a mind map

because he's doing the same thing. He's got him at the top

here as the brand, Then he's got his YouTube. Then he's got his TikTok. Then

he's got his speaking. Then he's got his courses. Then he's got his training. He's

got all this stuff that he's bringing to the table under this one brand,

but if you don't have clarity on how that

brand comes together and how you have you can paint a cohesive

picture to potential clients, it's just a

muddled mess, and that inspired me

to come back home. And after kicking rocks from getting my back

So I'd whooped in the in the mastermind. I started putting together a mind map.

So for people who didn't follow that, oh, a

mind map. Do we need to mind map my story? Was it was

it that convoluted? I think so. So a mind map is

basically a way that you can develop some clarity

around what it is you're trying to do. So

the way that Larry did it was

it's kind of like one of those, like, what is it called? Like, a spider

chart or something back in, like, elementary school. Never heard

it called a spider chart, Bet a full chart. Or maybe that's the circle kind.

I don't know. It's some kind of chart. But you put your brand on the

top and then that oh, it's kinda like a family tree. That's what it looks

like. Okay. Kinda like a family tree because then that breaks down

into the different areas that you wanna focus

on. And then from there, you break that into what exactly it is that

you do in those areas. Right? That sounds about right. Let's talk about upside

down family tree because the the trunk is your primary brand.

Right? And then you turn it upside down, and that's where all the branches come

into play and all the different components. I don't know. Upside down

at all. It's totally well, trees don't don't grow with the branches in the

ground. If you ever seen a family tree, it's like the ancestors at top, and

then it grows out with all of the different families. It depends on the

diagram. I've seen actual trees with branches. Anyways,

but, yeah, it could be the the the The the matriarchy

and patriarchy of the of the family, and then from there, it goes

it goes on down. Anyhoo, so

So when you started yours, like, what you did you broke it down

first into 3 different pieces. So what were those pieces? Well,

the very top piece. You know, I I started it all with Red Hat Media,

so that's at the the very top. That's driving everything. That's the

brand. The Red Hat, for me, obviously, is the brand, but

then I had to look and go, okay. What are the what are the primary

things that we do at Red Hat Media, and one of the primary

things that we focus on. And by we, I'm talking about

me because in my instance, a lot of the times, I really am just the

brand. It's me. So the 3 things that I focus on the

most are podcasting, branding,

and AI. So now granted, there's

some other fringe things that I I dabble in from time to time, but those

are the 3 primary focuses of me and what I bring to the

table for Red Hat Media. So that's where it came from me

and then branched off into those 3 areas of, I'll call it, areas of expertise

or primary areas of focus. And then we had to take it 1

step further, actually multiple step further steps further, there we

go, and had to start breaking out the specifics of

what our offerings and what our focus is on within each of

those 3, we'll call them, categories. And if it for people that

are listening to this and if they're you're struggling to follow this, we're actually putting

together a template of a mind map so

that you can look at it and fill it in for yourself. So that's gonna

be available linked in the show notes when this goes live.

So don't worry if this is hurting your head. You'll be able to

really visualize it. But I think it's interesting how so you

have podcasting, branding, and AI. Yeah. And then I feel like if I

were to do this, because I haven't done this yet, I feel like podcasting

might even be multiple things for me because

I'm looking at podcasting externally and

internally. Like, I wanna do branding, more I

do, branded podcasts for businesses,

but one of the things that I'm trying to get into and learn

more about is internal podcast, and I feel like that's even,

like, maybe its own thing. Like, I don't even know if those would be together.

I think they serve such unique purposes that it might be

smart to break them out into individual subcategories of their

own. Yeah. And, you know, in in you were talking about just a minute

ago, if folks that are listening or having a hard time picturing it,

that's the whole purpose of this mind map is so that you can draw a

picture Mhmm. Of your brand and a picture of your

business model. And when I started doing this, and I think we've talked about it

on other episodes, You know, the my website's going under a revamp

right now as well, and my web developer is sitting right here. And I appreciate

everything that she does for me in that arena because she's also very talented there.

But she goes, alright, man. We can redo this, and I can make it look

however you want it to look. But what's the content? What do you want on

the damn site? And that's right. I don't know. Just put something up there that's

cool. So, like, a couple months

ago, the first time we did your site, that's literally what I

did because you're like, I have an event next week, and I don't have a

website. Can you make me 1? And I was like, alright.

Bet. And in, like, one day, create it. You said bet.

My New York just came out. Yeah. Right on. I dig it. I just created

a website based off of, like okay. I have a

General idea. We weren't even that close at the time, so it's like I had

a general idea of what you did, but Yeah. I didn't know like, I had

no clarity for your brand because neither did you. So now we

look at that site, and it it's lacks all brand

clarity because we didn't take the time to do this.

Right. And that's why this is so important. So anyone that is

struggling with that brand clarity, what is it that you

do? Who do you do it for? What are those offers?

This mind map is a way to get that down on paper

and have it in in front of you and breaking it down in a way

that it almost will resemble your

website map because you're going to use this to actually

Outline to your website visitors what it is

that you do because if you don't have clarity

on your brand, The people that you're trying to get to hire

you, they will have even less clarity

on your brand, and why would they hire you if they don't know what you

do? So And that can be painful too to have that realization. You

know? And and Oh, yeah. You know, going back to licking my own little wounds

here. You know, The whole hot seat thing, that that's that's it's been a couple

weeks, and it's still stinging a bit because it was literally you

don't have that clarity in your message. And The irony there is we see we

have a podcast called Freakin' Branded. So we're supposed to be the branding

experts and have a firm grasp on how we

convey our brand and our message that's behind our brand,

and here I am struggling to keep it straight. But

Not to make excuses. This year has been

an interesting year for me. There's been all sorts of developments

with the whole AI thing and the branding and the, you know, podcasting. I've been

in that game for for 10 years, going on 10 years now. So

that's pretty straightforward, but the other 2, it's been an evolution, and I

think that's something that we tend to go through,

as as entrepreneurs and business owners, but we have a very difficult

time keeping our message up to date with our evolution

as a business owner. Yeah. I think we also, like,

kind of cling to the ideas that we have at first a little

bit. And I I feel like I say this a lot, but I'm a very

much a do as I say, not as I do marketer because

I know marketing. I've been in marketing for since 20

Seventeen, if we're not counting, those, like, 6 internships in college and all of the

stuff I did in school. So I know marketing, and

I know what I should do for my company,

but I don't do it. But I'll still tell you to do it for yours.

Yeah. Because it's like I'd rather Take the time

working on client projects and making sure that I give them the best

product possible than spend the time to do it for myself. And I

feel like that's so common. Like, I cannot be the only

one that does that. And No. Both

of us are getting to that point where we're both like, okay. We need

to figure our own shit out because, like you said,

we're the branding people. Like, we could talk about this all day, but then you

look at our brands, and we're like, We need to start listening to our own

advice. Yeah. And it's it's sometimes that advice can can sting

more than just bringing it to your attention that you don't have the clarity you're

looking for, but it can sting because Your business and you as an

entrepreneur, you do evolve. And as you evolve, you

start to stand out in, potentially,

arenas that you never intended to be a part of. You

know, I mean, as as an example, the whole AI gig. Right? I've gotten

more attention and became more of a thought

leader in that space in this year alone

then it took me 10 years to get even in the podcast

space. If we look at it from the AI perspective, I mean, I've gone way

above and beyond any Success, quote, unquote, that I've experienced in the

podcast space. I mean, I've earned media attention

on ABC, on big name channels on television.

I'm consulting with the state of Texas on education and and the

impact that AI is having on education. It's it's just it's

opening up So many doors, and so you

have to look at it and go, okay. But I'm really a podcast guy. I

think you can be both. Having expertise in one

arena does not remove the expertise you have in another.

So I've become the podcast person too because

It's what I've been focusing on, and it's what I've been having a lot of

fun with, so it's what I've been really targeting right

now. But I actually I was working it was a

former client, and I was consulting for them

for their podcast, and We were looking at a landing

page that they had made, and the landing page was not good.

And I was like, okay. Well, here's all of my feedback, and I started pointing

things out. Like, Based on psychological studies of, like, eye mapping, I

would say move this over here. And, the way that our brain

reads words, if you have this all Capitalized is harder to read, so it's

like I would make this to just title caps. And

I'm telling them these things that I'm, like, Citing psychological

studies and all of this, and she stops me, and she's

like, this was made by marketers. That's their expertise.

You're the podcast expert, so let's focus on the podcast.

And I had to be like, ma'am, I'm

a marketing expert. I just focus on podcasts. Did you

not, like, did you not hear anything I just said? I didn't say, oh, you

know, I think this would be better. It's like, No. IMAP studies

have proven that this is what they will look at. We

can have more than 1 expertise, and it's when those,

Like, areas of expertise overlap, that's,

like, powerful. I don't think it's supposed to take away from

them. It's how do we use All of these things that we're like,

that we know and use them to build on each other.

Like, I'm also a personal finance I'm an accredited financial

counselor. That's nothing to do with marketing. Nothing to

do with media. I have to interrupt. You are all over the map Here, there

I have no idea what you do. What do you do? There's no

clarity. You're a finance expert. You're a marketing expert. You're a podcast expert. I

know. Right? How do you make all of this make sense?

Because it does, though. So, I mean, like I

said, I'm a finance expert. So At the time this is recording,

I'm few days away from leaving to speak at a finance conference on

how to use podcasts to grow a financial brand because

I've done that, because I worked in the finance space while using podcasting and

while using marketing. So I don't think it's a bad

thing to have Different areas that we're an expert

in if we can you like, harness them together. I guess that's that was

a really long winded way of saying that. No. I think it's great.

You you kept it off with with the emphasis on the fact that you're going

to speak in New Orleans at a finance conference. But what are you speaking about?

Podcasting. You're speaking about podcasting. And why do you have the opportunity to speak

about podcasting at a finance conference? Because I know finance. Bing. Bing. Bing.

Bing. Bing. There we go. We win the prize. So, you know,

having a diverse skill set and a diverse set of

offerings Under your brand isn't necessarily

the no no. It's not having the

continuity between each of these branches, We'll call

it. Going back to our family tree analogy. It's not having a a

uniform, collective, with your messaging and your

vision and your deliverables. That's the problem. We have

to also like, how can we reframe

these different expertise areas, these different niches, what have

you, into unique selling propositions for

ourselves. We had Gordon Firemark was just on the show. He's the podcast

lawyer. He and I had sat down and had dinner a week before

recording and because he was in town accepting his award,

and we ended up talking about my brand and what

my unique, selling points could be. And the finance piece was

one of them in a way that I didn't really See before. He

pointed it out in that I

spent, like, 4 or 5 years Working in

marketing for finance so that I know

how compliance works in finance.

And I haven't had something kicked back to me from compliance saying like,

oh, you can't say this since, like, the 1st year I was doing

it. So when I started working with a real estate firm

and they had they were doing real estate investing, the guy

looked visibly stressed having to explain to me what

compliance is, and I'm like, oh, no. I'm good. Like, I worked with CFPs for

years. Like like, I got this. Don't worry about it. And he just,

like, visibly relaxed. And, like, I've

worked with lawyers who have a lot of compliance. I've worked in health care that

has a lot of compliance. All of these industries that are so regulated.

I've done it before, and I understand it. And

that, I never thought of as a selling point.

But the way that he pointed it out to me that it actually is

was really interesting. Yeah. I think it's huge. And I I didn't

know where this realization came from, but I recognized

when you started emphasizing, compliance. It

was kind of interesting to see because the conversation started switching over, And

you started talking about it as a potential selling

proposition, how we could leverage that for internal podcast, and how

we could we could really lean into that. So Thanks, Gordon. Yeah.

Thanks, Gordon. Gordon, sharp fella. Sharp fella. I'll definitely

check out his podcast if you haven't yet. So But that that's that's

really what it amounts to, you know, is is understanding

your potential to offer a unique Selling

proposition because of your unique background. I mean, how

many people out there have a background that lines up exactly like Sara's?

Many people out there have a background that lines up exactly like mine?

It's very few. Mhmm. And while, again, it does

seem fragmented and it does seem all over the place, If you take the

time to step back and visualize

how all of these components not just go together, Not just

make sense under your primary brand, but how they complement each other

and and really elevate each other. And that's

what everything that I do at Red Hat Media and Sara does at favorite daughter

media and we do together at Brandon. And

Being able to put all of this on paper is

really the 1st step to figuring it out for

yourself. So going back to this idea of that mind

map, take that time to do it. Really sit down. Like

I said, we're gonna have that, template available for you.

So figure out what are the main

offerings. Like, what are the main Areas of expertise, I

guess. I like area of expertise. I think that's really good. That's kinda what we're

talking about. When we look at my podcasting, my branding, And in my AI,

that would be my areas of expertise. And then within each of those,

you've got the the the subcomponents to go into those. Each

Area of expertise and then break it down into what can you

offer. Like, how can you use that expertise in the service

of others? Looking at, let's say,

branding for, for Red Hat, you have that

broken down into speaking on branding, the

book that you're coming out with on branding, and then social media.

So how can we help others create a cohesive brand

for, for their own social media. The area of expertise

is branding, but from there, we break it down into what it

is we can help others do by

offering this expertise. Yeah. And and from there, you just break

down even further until you get down into these the just the the

the smallest details. And when you put that much thought, much time and

that much visualization into something, you're gonna discover things about each of

your brand components that relates to the others and how

you tie that together. And once you have it all tied together, then you can

start working on your messaging. You can talk about your vision and your

mission and your core values of your your business, but

It all dials right back to us. We have to have that clarity

before we can start trying to give that clarity to others. So

that's what we're talking about today, drawing it all out, putting together these mind

maps, and, hopefully, you can take some of the things that we said

here and Map out your own mind?

Create your little brain tree.

Create your little brain tree. Alright. Well, hopefully

hopefully with that, you're inspired to create your own personal brain

tree. I know Sara and I are actively working on ours. It's been a very,

very fun exercise, and, we're gonna continue to work through it

together, while we lay out this, this brand new website that I can't wait to

roll out. So with that, if you found some value in this episode, map it

out for us. Tell us all about it. And, while you're at it, also hit

that subscribe button so we can continue to bring you these insightful

conversations on each and every episode. With that, I'm Larry Roberts. I'm Sara

Lohse. We'll talk to you next week.