What Does Branding Mean for Your Small Business? Why Is It Important to Get Right?

Watch The Advice Business Podcast

You want your brand to look great, and you want it done yesterday. But quality branding takes time.

Time to think. Time to refine. Time to align all the moving parts of your business into something cohesive and intentional.

Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither was a brand that actually works.

One of the worst things you can do is rush the process or cheap out on it (whether with time or money) just to get something out the door. I’ve seen it firsthand: brands that sprint toward “done” instead of “right” and end up redoing everything a year later.

That’s not to say that there are no instances where templates or AI can help, which I’ll also dive into. But in reality, a brand that works takes intention.

Why Is Branding Important?

I recently listened to an episode of The Advice Business Podcast featuring John Scianna, Founder and Creative Director at Objective Brand. I worked under John at Objective Brand, and if there’s one thing he knows, it's branding (but I promise he knows a lot more than that!)

The episode discusses the rebrand of Seeds, an investing platform for financial advisors. They explain what their rebrand did for them and the importance of high-quality branding.

“The question isn’t, is it possible to succeed without a good brand, it’s, are you setting yourself up for success?”

— John Scianna, Objective Brand

He’s right. Slapping together a brand and hoping it holds up is like building a house without checking the foundation. You might get lucky, but more likely, you’re going to run into problems down the line.

Great Branding Builds Trust

When your messaging is aligned, it shows, and that kind of clarity builds trust. People start to associate your brand with an aspiration, feeling, or experience.

That’s how you cultivate a community that sticks around. When your brand looks and sounds like you (and is built on authenticity), your people will believe in it.

They'll feel confident hitting follow, clicking the link, buying the thing. That trust doesn’t happen overnight. It grows with every touchpoint and reinforces your company as reliable.

What If You Don't Have the Budget to Hire A Branding Specialist?

“If you have a limited budget, where do you start—what’s the first thing that you do? I think I have a contrary view than usual…you can do that early messaging, thinking, positioning, who you’re talking to…but all of that will fall on deaf ears if you have a terribly unprofessional website, brand, or messaging system.”

— John Scianna, Objective Brand

If you’re a small business with limited resources, you’re likely tempted to use AI or pre-packaged templates as your branding. If you simply can’t afford to invest in branding off the bat, Canva templates, AI-generated designs, and website builders can all be good starting points.

The problem arises when a free template becomes the entire identity of your business. When your logo, your website, tone of voice, and messaging all start to feel generic, you become disconnected from what makes your business unique. Pre-made assets should be used to get you off the ground, not build your legacy.

Go ahead and grab a professionally thought-out design that looks nice. Then, when you can, invest in customization. That could mean hiring a freelance designer to tweak the template so it feels more like you, or working with a small, creative marketing firm that can help you develop a system that grows with your business.

When you are ready to create a brand that no one else has (because you’re like no one else), spend the time, energy, and money on doing it right so you don’t find yourself rebranding in six months. Oh, and call me.