Article written by Anthony Bourbon.
Consumers do not want to buy a simple product, they want to join an adventure, participate in something that goes beyond them and that triggers an emotion in them. To succeed in this feat, you must have a very clear WHY, and succeed in making it shine.
What is WHY?
This is your personal life goal. This is what you will think about on your deathbed. It's the reason you get up every morning. It's the reason your business exists. This is why your team will join you. It's the driving force behind everything you'll build.
In this article we will explain how and why it is vital to define your Why as a business but also as a person.
Promise and mission, what are the differences?
Firstly, you must be able to differentiate between your promise and your mission.
Your promise is your WHY. What some call brand purpose. This is your personal reason for being. It's almost philosophical, and unattainable. It is often linked to the founder.
For example, at Feed. our promise is to create a new society based on meritocracy. Change the system and give a chance to those who don't have one.
Your brand mission is more concrete, product-based and should be able to summarize what you offer. For example at Feed., our mission is to help people achieve their goals through nutrition.
At first glance, we may not fully understand the relationship between a brand that sells meal bars and an almost societal promise. However, when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. Feed. pushes its consumers to surpass themselves and achieve their personal goals, to escape their initial condition. Feed. allows you to put yourself in a mindset of success. By helping people believe in themselves, Feed. participates in reshuffling the cards, and redistributing them based on a principle of meritocracy.
The promise and the mission must be at the heart of all the choices you make and will allow you to stay on course, a line of sight. The mission, which will bring you money, is not an end, but rather a means to achieve your promise. And it is the latter that will allow you to really differentiate yourself from the competition. Others will be able to copy your products, your ideas, poach your profiles, but they will never be able to copy your personal story, and therefore your promise. If they try, they won't be authentic and consumers will smell it.
How do I define my values?
When you have your promise and your mission, you still need to define the values that will accompany you during your adventure. These values will allow you to maintain a consistent course of action and find people aligned with your personality.
Ask your loved ones what words come to mind immediately when they think of you. There are bound to be similarities in all the answers you accumulate. The words that come up often will be your values, and therefore those of your company. For months, the values that came up often and which are today on all the walls of our offices were: Ambition, passion, resilience, determination.
Why a WHY?
If you only work for money, you will give up when it gets difficult, when no one believes in you anymore. But if you fight for a cause more rooted in your personal history, you will never give up. Keeping in mind why you are working is a true source of infinite motivation. Your Why will help you to be creative, innovative and to surpass yourself.
Your Why will also be useful to you in your decision-making. Every time you have to make an important decision you can ask yourself “does this help me achieve my end goal?”.
If we wanted to picture all of this, we could say that your entrepreneurial adventure is a journey, that turnover is the fuel to move your car forward (the mission) and arrive at your destination (the promise).
