Archetypes in Branding

Ian Paget: Something I'd like to start with doing the research for this interview. One of the first things I would obviously do is have a look at your website and your social, and see what you're all about. And one of the things that came up was that you describe yourself as a psychology driven brand strategist? I've not heard this term before, so I think a good question to start things off is what is that?

Kaye Putnam: I think this is actually the first time I've been asked and I am so thrilled to answer. And I'm going to answer in two parts. Firstly, I imagine those who are listening to this episode know what a brand strategist is, but I came to branding through the marketing world, I had a marketing degree and I realised that marketing wasn't the be all and end all. There was really something underneath the marketing strategy and campaign that was dictating if a business was going to succeed or not, and that was the brand.

So I've turned my focus completely to branding and then the psychology driven part has come from a deep obsession with figuring out why humans make the decisions that they make. And there was a Harvard study that showed that up to 95% of all decisions are made on the subconscious level. So I realised the importance of speaking on this subconscious level to the humans that we are trying to attract through our brands, so to make that distinction, it's not just the design, it's not just that tip of the iceberg, we're really addressing what's going on underneath all of the design and voice choices that we make, like almost I call myself the psychology driven brand strategist.

Ian Paget: I love that and I'm really excited to chat about this. I think this could be a really interesting conversation to get into some of this stuff. So going through your website to try and understand what this is. I've had a brief understanding of the type of thing that you would look into and I did notice that you do focus on the brand archetypes, is that correct? And if that is, would you mind talking through what that is? The audience that might not be familiar with what that is can understand it.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, discovering brand archetypes was such a major epiphany moment for me in my business and it gave me a way to understand the reasons why the brands that I was attracted to were so compelling. So brand archetypes are these unconscious categories or patterns that show up across culture, across different times. We see them when we're walking down the aisles of the grocery store and we see them when we are watching a movie or reading a book. So there's 12 archetypes that I personally work with. The 12 archetypes are all correlated to different universal human values, so I can share the names of the 12 if that would be useful.

Ian Paget: Yeah, sure. I mean with podcast, I do like to give people a seed to look into stuff themselves. So if you can talk through what they are, if you want to go into more detail you can, but I think it'd be good to maybe point people towards where they can look into it to understand each one because you know, I don't think that would be the best use of your time.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, 100%. And we don't have enough time to do the deep dive on each of the 12. But as an introduction, there is the caregiver which is also known as the mother, or the servant, or the martyr. There's the creator which is also artist, designer, maker. Entertainer which is sometimes a comedian, or a jester. The explorer is the adventure or pioneer. We have the girl or guy next door which is sometimes known as the everyman, or the realist, or friend. The hero is the warrior, champion, victor. The innocent brand archetype is the purest, or idealist, or traditionalist. We also have the lover archetype which is heart centred, partner, beauty focused.

Magician archetype is the transformer, the visionary. The maverick archetype is the rebel, or revolutionary. The royal archetype is sometimes known as the king, or queen, or CEO type and then we have the sage which is the teacher, expert, mentor. So even hearing the names, you can start to understand how different brands in our lives play different roles or can be associated with some of those different names, whereas others are associated with other names. So it's a way of positioning our brand in the market, a way of standing out beyond just our product or our service. It connects us to deeper psychological values.

Ian Paget: Sure, fantastic. And in terms of understanding those, because you said that… you know we can probably talk hours about each one if you was too deep dive in on them. But from a practical point of view, it doesn't make sense to use that time here. I think we should send people towards something. Is there a book or a resource or something so that people can learn what each one of these are? Feel free to plug something you've got out there, or a book recommendation or something like that.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, yes. When I first discovered them, it was through this like rabbit hole of internet links I found on this website that looked like it was built in the 1990s, which disclosed these 12 archetypes, I was like, what is this sorcery? Because as soon as I read through the list of them and what their different motivations and fears were, I was like, oh, this brand that I'm following is the hero archetype. This other brand that I'm following is the royal and so on. So I was immediately drawn into this framework and this idea. After that serendipitous discovery…

Ian Paget: A moment of… You found something special.

Kaye Putnam: Yes. True magic. I started just obsessively curating examples of each of these archetypes and how they apply particularly to small businesses. So not just the Nike, and the Harley Davidson and the massive billion-dollar brands of this world, but how can we as small business owners use them. So if you want to uncover what your brand archetype is… I actually created a quiz, I published it first in 2013. It's now been taken over 200,000 times and it helps to identify what your primary archetype is. So that would be a great place to start. If you want the deep dive into the 12. The person that has done probably the most amount of publishing around the 12 archetypes that I use is Carol S. Pearson and Margaret Mark. They have a book about the 12 archetypes that you can read all about them, but if you are more interested in the application, actually putting them to work in your brand and in your business, I think I have collected an amazing set of resources for each of the 12.

Ian Paget: Cool. And what I can do is I can link to those resources that you mentioned and the book that you mentioned in the show notes for this episode as well. So people can go and look into that in more detail. Sounds pretty special. So hopefully people will find it useful. Okay, so you mentioned that you use 12. That implies that there are more that some people use. Can you explain that briefly, so that people got an idea of what they could potentially find when looking into this stuff?

Kaye Putnam: Yes. So it's not a scientific framework. It's a useful framework.

Ian Paget: Sure. I think that goes with anything with branding because people are always looking like how do you do brand strategy? And there isn't one way, there's just lots of frameworks that help you to solve it. And this sounds like one of those many tools that you could potentially use.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, exactly. So the 12 are focused on core values, but as you can imagine, there's not a definitive set of values that humans are attracted to. So I think that the 12 do a really good job of representing the breath of what people care about. So for example, the girl or guy next door is really related to community and comradeship. The hero is related to achievement and overcoming challenges and so on. So I think that the 12 is a good mix a very useful mix, but even myself in… so I have courses that are related to each of the 12, and in each of those courses identify three subtypes of each of the archetypes, you can continue to split hairs and see different representations or different examples of different archetypes that are slightly different from each other, but at the end of the day we want this to be something that can help us simplify our decision making, not make it endlessly confusing.

Ian Paget: Oh yeah, of course. And from a process point of view and you finding these, something I always find really useful and it's why I like interviewing so many different people. It's that nobody works in the same way. So it doesn't… especially with brand strategy, it doesn't matter who you speak to, everyone approaches things in a slightly different way. And you mentioned that you had that moment where you found that really dated looking website but had great information on it. Was that based on the 12 that you use, or was that almost like a rabbit hole? And then you went down this rabbit hole, found all these different things and then created 12 that you personally use based on all of the information that you collected.

Kaye Putnam: Those 12 are pretty close to the 12 that I use. I made some shifts again because I'm approaching this kind of like general psychology framework with the application to brands. So in some cases like the Maverick on that website was called something else. What was it called? The Outlaw, I believe. And there's slightly different names and I wanted all of the names to sound attractive to brands. I wanted all of them to want… actually no, the Maverick was called the destroyer on that website that I stumbled on. I'm like, well, I don't know if a brand necessarily wants to be a destroyer. Same with every man. I don't necessarily think that every… or that a brand would want to blend in with all of the average. So I did some tweaking just to make it more applicable to brands. But I did stick pretty closely to those cores 12. We've seen from other like psychologists and other brand strategists, they'll either rename things for their own reasons or they're working from a different framework. But the key is to ask yourself, is whatever framework that I'm using, is it helping me make powerful decisions that are making my brand more compelling? And I think if it is then that's perfect.

Ian Paget: Yeah. I think what I want to make sure that the audience understands from this is that you found something and you thought it was special that it could be used based on your marketing background to help potential clients build brands, but you didn't just take it for what it is. And I think this is important because like I was saying when I go on your website, you aren't just a brand strategist, you are a psychology driven brand strategist. You've found, I guess your unique voice for this, you differentiated yourself what's out there, you found something that's compelling and you've made it your own, you haven't just taken something and just started using it, you've learned about it, you've understood it, you've adapted it for what field could work for your clients and you've made it your own and I think this is one of the most important things really, especially with strategy is that there are so many different ways of doing this that you can borrow from lots of different places, which is what you've done, but you adapt it and make it your own thing. So that is actually useful for you and useful for your clients. And I think from I guess from a business building perspective, it sets you apart from what else is out there. You know, you're not just another brand strategist, you just happen to be from a positioning point of view, you're promoting yourself that you're more focused on the psychology side of things, so it's cool.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, 100%. And I think that we all stand on the shoulders of giants, so there's a lot of things that are universally true about the world and we don't necessarily need to reinvent the wheel, but at the same time I've basically created my own PhD in this approach to branding. I've spent thousands, thousands of hours curating all of these different examples and making it more applicable and making it useful and all of those things. So I really appreciate you saying that because it's absolutely true. It's not something that I found in a textbook and was just like, okay, this is what I'm going to do.

Ian Paget: Yeah, exactly. And I really want to stress it because I don't want people listening to the podcast and just taking what I'm saying or what I guess to say, and just like copying it because that's not the right way of doing it. You know, you need to make it your own, you need to do that in order for you to stand out, but in order so that you're comfortable with the tools that you're using, because if something doesn't work, like you mentioned that there was some of the names that just didn't apply to you or your client, so you adjusted it, and it's not that you've reinvented the wheel, it's more that you've made it more appropriate to what you're doing and in the process makes you stand out from the crowd that's out there and I think that's important.

Kaye Putnam: Yes. And I feel like human knowledge and wisdom is constantly being expanded and it's such a… I'm getting a little philosophical here, but it's such a fun role to play to continue to take what's out there, and deepen it, and expand it, and to help other people understand it in different ways. I think that we… especially as brand strategists or people that work with businesses and brands, we have this unique opportunity to impact the world in really wide ways by applying what we know to these businesses that are directly working with other businesses or with clients.

Ian Paget: Oh, for sure. And I think putting it into like logo design, it's actually a really exciting time to be doing any of this stuff because really, in terms of like the styles that graphic designers are applying, they wasn't there that long ago really like this is all really fairly new still like in the last like 100 years or so, these stars that were adapting have come into play and we're all learning from the same sources, but it doesn't mean that, you know, based on what you said there, it doesn't mean that what they have is setting stone and we need to follow it. We can just take what they learn and what they created, and apply it to new stuff because all the social media didn't exist 20 years ago. There's so much new technology and new applications for this sort of stuff that you can't just take something that was developed 100 years ago or so you have to take those things and adapted to what's here today. So you are right, when you think about it, we have to keep modifying it and I guess it's pretty exciting. We can make our mark on that and then pass on to the next generation.

Kaye Putnam: Yes. It's such a fascinating moment in time in business right now. I feel like everything is evolving so quickly. So consumers have more options than ever. So brands have this unique challenge and opportunity to stand out and to take a stand in ways that they've never taken before. And we have the opportunity as designers and strategists to help brands communicate something that is actually meaningful to the people that they're trying to attract instead of just being a better, faster widget or whatever it is that they're selling.

Ian Paget: Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so we've got an understanding of what these archetypes are and the psychology aspect that you focus on. Obviously, people can go and read the books, check out the resources that you mentioned to, look into that in more detail if they want to. But I think the key thing that everyone is going to be wondering is what do you actually do with this? How do you actually apply this to a brand project? What does your process look like to apply this to a logo or an identity or a brand?

Kaye Putnam: Yes, I love geek about this. So, because we're starting with a kernel of truth, I always like to say that we build brands on truth not trends. We get to start to make discernment about the decisions that we're making in terms of the brand expression based on these core truths. So if we want our brand to be a maverick brand, for example, we know that we want it to feel revolutionary, to feel bold, to feel different than everything else that's out there. So that can help us start to inform all of the decisions of all of the expressions that we're making in this brand. It's going to inform the stories that we tell, it's going to inform the colours that we choose for the brand, it's going to inform the shapes that we're using and the fonts and everything else. So we're using the archetypes as a jumping off point because it has a whole set of cliche expressions of that archetype, and we can then use that starting place of truth to make decisions about how we're going to express it in this particular context, in this particular brand.

Ian Paget: Sure. And in terms of the clients, how do they know which archetype they are? How does the client go about figuring it out or how do you work with the client to figure out?

Kaye Putnam: Yes, so I send all of my clients to my quiz and actually a lot of my peers have a lot of designers and coaches and copywriters that use this framework will literally just send their clients to my quiz which is totally fine and appreciated. I love that.

Ian Paget: Oh, yeah. I get it.

Kaye Putnam: But depending on your knowledge of all 12… and I do a lot of teaching of designers and creatives to help them understand all 12 on a deeper level. Once you know, kind of what each of them stand for and what each of them represent, then we can just interview our clients and start to listen to their language, and what they're talking about, and what they value to help pair them to a primary archetype. So if a brand is for example, talking about like getting back to basics, simplifying things, just like taking something that's really complicated and putting it into easy to understand steps. My brain because I understand the archetypes is immediately going to the innocent archetype. So if they continue to reinforce those messages in the stories that they're telling me, what they're telling me about their brand or their product, then I can use my knowledge of the archetypes, my understanding and then that innocent archetype too, then make decisions about how they should be expressing themselves in their colours that they're choosing, the fonts, and all of those things that we have in our toolbox to communicate that innocent archetype meaning to the market.

Ian Paget: I think with archetypes, this is a significant thing and I think as a brand strategist or people that aren't necessarily into brand strategy, you tend to think that it's only large organisations that might want to apply these and use these and so on. But you mentioned that it's particularly useful and important for small companies. How are you convincing them that they need this and this could be useful for them?

Kaye Putnam: I think this is part of the magic of building a brand right now is that there is less convincing that needs to happen, meaning, I am very focused on putting my brand out into the market, so creating content in showing up in communicating my values. My two archetypes are the magician and the sage. So I'm basically walking my talk and embodying my own archetypes, and people that are interested in doing business in this way, in standing out on this deep unconscious psychological level, instead of just having a better product or better service, because they're seeing that isn't working for them, they find me.

Ian Paget: Sure.

Kaye Putnam: I think that when brands are branded well, they become an attraction mechanism instead of something that exists to convince people. So it's a shift that's happening in the market. So instead of just having those three radio stations and tv stations where we're going out and blasting a message again and again and again, we now get to become a value to our clients, and to stand out based on our personal values, so values like transformation and evolution and being future focused and the people that are interested in those things recognise that, and they find us, and they love that. So it's an interesting question because I haven't had to convince people, I've just been embodying this in my own business.

Ian Paget: I think that's the real power of knowing who you are, what you do, having a clear process, communicating that effectively on your website, so that people that need that… and I think branding is key, really, there's so many books out there. So if you are into marketing or business or anything like that, you're going to come across branding and you will know that brand strategy is important for this. And I think people that are listening to this, graphic designers, even graphic designers fall down. You realise after a length of time that in order to do a graphic design effectively, you do need to go to the roots of what the company is and that's where brand strategy falls into place. And that's why even though this is a logo design podcast, it’s why I like to talk about brand strategy frequently, because it is a key aspect of it, and in order to create a logo or any form of graphic design work, you need to know who you are and I think that's important, and you've done that to your own business. So when people realise that they need that they are… I don't know how exactly they're approaching it in your case, but probably using google, find you, find your quiz, seeing what you're talking about and getting in touch. So it's good to hear that it sounds like when people pick up the phone to speak to you, they already know that they want, which is good.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, I much prefer to do business that way. You're absolutely right, like as people that are helping other businesses express their brand, express their business, we absolutely need to know what they're trying to express first, before we can effectively design for them.

Ian Paget: Yeah, exactly. I also want to say that, I think this is the kind of reasoning for niche in down and having a very specific service offering, so when people need that, they can find you and they know that you specialise in that thing because I think that's something that you do really well. I think people should go and check out your website and see how you are communicating what you're doing. You're a very good case study for people to look into and learn from, I think

Kaye Putnam: Thank you, I appreciate that. I think one of the best things that all brands can do and designers are especially guilty of this, and I can say this because I come from that world, but we don't want to ever have this situation where the cobbler's shoes are falling apart, right? We don't want to just rely on referrals and those kinds of things. It's a fantastic way to get started, but it doesn't build a lasting business that has a lot of incoming leads coming to us, we want to be in control of that lead flow and the best way to do that is to embody exactly what you're selling and to be a good example of it.

Ian Paget: Mm-hmm. You definitely do that well. I do want to bring up you've mentioned it already about the brand personality quiz. and what I think is great about this, and I would love to ask like not just what it is, but how you went about creating it. I think this is a great example of how to get people to your website and to be positioned as somebody that knows what they're talking about because you've mentioned this brand quiz within this just through the conversation, just as a way of people to figure out what their brand archetype is, and I haven't used it myself, I don't know exactly what questions there are, or exactly how it works, but it sounds like you've done it so that anybody can go on there figure out what their brand archetype is, take that information for free if they want to, and then apply it to their own thing. But correct me if I'm wrong with that assumption, but that's a really good toll for attracting people because what will happen is people like me or people listening to this, now that they're aware of this, they might send potential clients to you. You know, aunties, uncles, cousins, brothers, other graphic designers, it doesn't matter who it is, as long as somebody knows about that, when somebody needs to figure out what their brand archetype is, they would just send them to your tool. It's a useful tool that people can use and it's helpful to them, but for you it's a powerful tool. Right?

Kaye Putnam: Yes. I could talk about the quiz as a lead generation strategy for hours, so I will try to be succinct.

Ian Paget: Go for it. Talk about it. This is the LogoGeek Podcast. We could do go really nerdy on specific things. People love it, so something I do with this podcast… originally, I just interviewed logo designers and that's how it kind of started out, but now it's more focused on helping people to make a living designing logos. And I think, you can't just sit there designing logos all day and post picture on Instagram or whatever, that just doesn't work. You need to be more creative and more savvy as to the approaches that you take. I think the more ideas that people can have the better. And I think this is one good example where you've created something useful, but actually it also is a fantastic lead generation, so feel free to talk about as much as you want. I'm cool with it personally and I'm sure the listeners want to hear about it as well.

Kaye Putnam: Perfect. Yes. So when I first discovered those 12 archetypes, my analytical mind just immediately desired to know which of the 12 I was, and I won't get too deep into childhood in those kinds of things, but I was always kind of a shapeshifter in a way like I was always just showing up. However, I thought other people wanted me to show up. So I actually didn't know immediately when I read through the 12 which one I was. So I wanted a tool to help identify what that was for me based on my values and my story, my strength and all those things. So I created the quiz as a tool for myself and it has taken a life of its own. It's been pretty magical. I think the reason why it works so well is because it is useful. It is answering a question that people have or it's providing some value, that people were already desiring. People want to know what makes them different from everybody else in their market, what rises their brand beyond just being a commodity, whether they're a product or service. And I shared the quiz with some clients and then I shared it with some people in my industry, and ever since then it's just been growing exponentially like I mentioned, it's been taken hundreds of thousands of times. I do promote it very actively these days. I run adds to it and I show up on podcasts and talk about it. Because it's a perfect introduction to my work. It's actually not the only thing that I do with my clients. We don't talk about archetypes all day long. But it's a perfect segue into everything else that we talk about because it answers that fundamental question of who am I, who is my brand. And the quiz has been on different platforms. It currently is on a tool called TryInteract. So if ever you are continually answering a question for your clients that has more than two answers. So it's not just a yes or no question, and it's something that you would need to coach people through. You know, has many different factors. Another kind of like a fundamental question that I always get is should I need my business a brand name, or should I be a personal brand. So, this could actually be another example. It is two answers. But it's a complicated question to answer based on many different factors. So anytime you have that complicated question, you could create a tool like a quiz. But it doesn't necessarily even have to be a quiz. Whenever we lead with value, we lead with being useful to people, and use that as a client attraction mechanism. It works so much better than continually trying to sell, sell. It shifts that equation to one of generosity instead of just trying to convince people to work with us.

Ian Paget: Mm-hmm. There’re so many different ways of doing that type of thing. It could be blogs, podcasts, social content, downloadable eBooks, products, a quiz like what you've done. But the general sentiment of what you said is so important that people understand because you… like personally I don't really sell, I just happened to talk about logo design as much as I can, trying to be helpful for. I mean being honest, mainly being helpful for graphic designers, but clients still find stuff. So when they do need something around that topic, they can see that you're helping people, they can see that you know what you're talking about that you're great at what you do. It's a much better process than the more traditional kind of slimy sales pitch. Because if you do it right. People know what you do. They can see that you know what you're talking about. They already want to go ahead with you. And then when they call, I bet you convert so many of the people that call.

Kaye Putnam: I've even gotten to the point where I rarely need sales calls anymore to be honest.

Ian Paget: That's a good place to be in because I know on your website you've even got prices and everything. So it's pretty clear because I don't publish prices. So generally, after I've talked through how I work and all that sort of stuff. Generally, the next question is how much, but on your website is pretty clear, it's all there and that's amazing. So you don't need to really have… people just emailing you saying can we go ahead when can we start?

Kaye Putnam: Pretty much, yes. 

Ian Paget: That's a good place to be in.

Kaye Putnam: Oh, it is. It really is. Of course, I didn't start here. It always takes a kind of a hybrid approach when you're just getting started I think where you're putting yourself in spaces where people are already looking for help. So in the beginning I absolutely was doing things like replying to jobs on job boards and reaching out to my network and doing that proactive approach. But over time I've built up this brand presence, this body of work online that does the attraction work for me. Big Pizza is the quiz. I'm also on social media, other places. But when we can lead with that generosity first people in a way… this doesn't sound quite right, but in a way, people feel indebted because they've already gotten a result, they've already transformed in some way by interacting with our content when we do it right, and then they're so much more likely to pay for further transformation.

Ian Paget: Oh yeah, for sure. I mean that's very much true of like podcast host that bring out books, people already know the information that's in the book because they've learned it from the podcast, but they want to in a way to give back. I think when you're doing client services it's bigger. But if they've looked into that kind of thing and they can see that it's helping their business, this is great for start-up companies because you've created a tool that will help them figure out who they are. And if they see, oh this is useful, but we need some more guidance, then who are they going to go to? They're going to go straight to the person that helped them initially. Like they probably don't even think of other people. They are like we want Kaye to help with this.

Kaye Putnam: Yeah, exactly. When you think about it, we don't need another to-do list app, or we don't need another brand of ice cream. But the reasons why new entrances to the market work is because they're willing to take a stand and to carve out a space in the market that other people weren't addressing. And I think that the archetypes are such a cool way to discover that message or that position to help you stand out in new ways, and you're absolutely right by leading with education, I become a natural first thought when somebody is ready to take that leap and get support.

Ian Paget: Absolutely. Another thing I want to talk about and again, this is something that you're great at is that you have clearly defined processes and you trademark the name of it. So I noticed that you have clarity code and I noticed it's got the little TM on it. So I assume that you trademarked it.

Kaye Putnam: Yup.

Ian Paget: So I think we should talk about this a little bit. We are already like 40 minutes into this conversation. Time's gone quick. But this process, what is that process and so that we can help listeners that might not have a process yet. How did you go about creating that?

Kaye Putnam: One of the most powerful things that any service creator and product businesses for that matter, but even more for service providers can do is to create a proprietary process. So a proprietary process helps elevate us beyond other people that offer similar services or products because it shows people that you have a proven method to create the results that you create, and it helps instil trust that you know what you're doing. So I've developed over the last decade, what I call my clarity code process and it is all of the elements that make a successful brand. And I've organised it into this framework that is denoted by the word code.

• C: Character. It's who the brand is.
• O: Offer.
• D: Building Demand.
• E: Energetic influence or the energy of the entrepreneur behind the business, the visionary.

So by having this process to find it gives me a way to organise my own thoughts because the way that I came up with it was sitting down with myself with the question how can I create the most transformational and valuable results for the clients that I work with? What are the ingredients of that equation and put it together into a framework that I can talk about. And it creates a little bit of curiosity. So I'm leaning onto some psychological principles here, by naming something it becomes more valuable and it also induces curiosity of like, okay, what is this thing? Obviously, I can only get the clarity code if I go to Kaye and not other places, so it creates value and it creates brand equity. So yeah, if you have not yet created a process behind the results in the transformation that you deliver, I highly recommend doing that. 

Ian Paget: I'm going to intentionally not ask you what the process is because I think this is interesting. I mean I can think of branding frameworks that have names that are obviously intellectual property for people, and those names have I guess such strength in the industry that people are like, what is it? How do I use that? How can I get that? And it has, I guess… it is from a psychological point of view, you feel like it's much more substantial than it probably is. I'm not saying that your process isn't substantial because it sounds like you put a lot of time, and thought, and energy into it. But there is a big difference between saying my brand strategy process than saying clarity code, and saying in the way that you did say beautifully, then it gives so much presence. I don't really know how to say what I'm trying to say, but it just seems much more authoritative. It positions you as not an expert as “The Expert” because only you have that particular process, only you have that particular framework that can come up with the solution, it just sounds so good. It's a really good lesson. So I think if there's listeners out there and you're working on your own business, we all know that process is key. You have to have a process. But what you said then about making a proprietary process is just next level. This is like if you want to go from just being somebody that's doing brand strategy to being someone that's a pro, then obviously you can do that, and I'm sure we can apply this to anything, like it doesn't matter what you do, whether it's a product or you're doing logo design. You can come up with a framework and create a name and trademark it in the way that you've done and I think that's a powerful thing, and I think people should, you know, if they're going to take anything from this interview, understand that what you've done is found great information, understood it, made it your own, turned it into a process and then made that your own intellectual property that you are able to sell as a service. But then you could probably sell that as a maybe you do because you have mentioned about courses, but you can teach that, you can do so much more with that. It's incredibly valuable.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, on so many different levels. It's incredible marketing like you identified, it gives you wait in the market. It also helps you productize your service, so you're not doing something different for every single client. It creates boundaries and reduces the scope of what you're doing with each client so that you don't have a lot of scope creep, which I know is a problem with designers. Yeah, there's just there's massive benefits. You can create templates to speed up your work. You can create your own tools and frameworks that support that process so that you deliver better results and you can do that in a more profitable way.

Ian Paget: Sure. That's really good and we've got about 10 minutes left and I'm going to try and get as much of much value out of you in this time. So you have this process. Again, I intentionally didn't ask you about it because I want people to create their own processes and create their own intellectual property because I think that's important. But at the end of this, you are providing the client something. And again, I looked on your website all unique to you. You have what you call the brand source book, do you want to talk about that? So people got an idea of what your…so when people have gone through your framework, what a client would get at the end of that process.

Kaye Putnam: Yes. So when I work with my consulting clients, one on one, we develop for them, the deliverable from that process is what we call brand source book. It is brand standards on steroids, it goes so much beyond just the visual standards of the brand. We help them identify not only with their brand archetype is and how that's showing up in their business, but all of those other elements of the clarity code framework, the offer, the way that they're building demand, etcetera. And this source book is a living breathing document that is incredible for brands that are scaling. So if you think about the biggest brands in the world, if they didn't have brand standards and rock solid strategy, Every single designer that came into that business or every single creative that came into their business would have their own variation of what they think Nike should look like or what they think X brand should look like. By having a very comprehensive set of brand standards and strategy documented it gives people the ability to scale by onboarding more creatives into their business, by maybe you're equipping a social media manager to post on your behalf, but it needs to be on brand, or maybe you are hiring customer service manager who also needs to be on brand. It aligns everybody within a business to a singular vision and a singular set of standards. So that's the way that we work with our one on one clients. That's what we deliver to them.

Ian Paget: It just sounds amazing. And I think, like I've said so many times through this, you're a really good case study for how to do this stuff well, like it doesn't matter if you are into branding, strategy, graphic design, I think how you are approaching everything is very good. You are a very good example, not just in terms of how you're presenting your work, and the story, and the knowledge, and the information, attracting clients by the process, creating your own intellectual property. You're doing everything the way that it should be done and I really do want to encourage listeners to not just listen to this because obviously there's a lot more that can be learned about the archetypes and stuff like that, but they should go and check out your website, have a look for everything properly. Obviously don't copy because I'm stressing, I'm really trying to stress that you need to create your own, you need to create your own thing, that's how you position yourself, that's where you stand out because you haven't just taken somebody else's framework, you've made your own based on lots of different things and I think people should go and check out your website which I linked to in the show notes and look at the books and the resources and stuff that we've spoken about in this podcast.

Kaye Putnam: Yes, thank you so much and I appreciate hearing that so much, especially at this stage in business. I've been in business now for over a decade, but when I first started this did not come easy to me, I didn't have a strong identity, I didn't have my own intellectual property, like all of this was developed over time and it makes business so much easier once you get to this point, it just instils so much confidence, and just having clients that are coming to you that are excited to work with you to understand your value from the start, it makes life just so much better as an entrepreneur and as a business owner. So I think that that was kind of a secret power of mine in a way that it didn't come easy because I had to figure this out by studying brands that were working really well, by distilling what actually mattered out of all of the different frameworks that are out there into something that I knew was actually going to move the needle, by testing it, by proving it, by actually doing it in the market. So I really appreciate the kind words.

Ian Paget: Yeah, and I think it's really important that you said that this has taken your time, somebody that's new in the industry or just starting out that is inspired by you ,could be overwhelmed by the volume of stuff, but like with everything something I've always found with creating your own business versus working for a company, when you work for a company and you do something simple like a form, and you get that form finished, it's just another thing that needs doing, but when you create these things for your own company, once you've done it, that adds to it and you keep building on what you have, so over a decade you've probably just gradually added these things on and you started with nothing, and you got to a point where you have this, so there's a lot of lessons in here for people that I think are quite experienced, but in terms of people starting out, I do have like dedicated podcast to getting your first client and stuff like that. So if you are listening and some of the stuff in this sounds a bit scary, go back to those and listen to those podcasts. There's a really good one I did with Tom Ross and Michael Janda. That episode with those guys, talking about how to get your first client is fantastic. And then when you're ready to take things to the next level, there's so many great lessons in this beyond understanding archetypes and stuff like that. There's a lot of really good lessons in this for building your business, and managing your company and all that sort of stuff. So it's been a really valuable episode, but I think now is probably a good time to wrap this up. I know that you've got a meeting shortly after this. Honestly, Kaye, thank you so much for coming on. This has been absolutely fantastic. I think in terms of understanding like psychology driven brand strategy, if anyone wants to look into that, this has been a good foundation, people then can then go and look into it and then go down their own rabbit hole. But thank you, it's been amazing.

Kaye Putnam: Thank you so much. I love to geek out about branding, and logo design, and graphic design, and all of these things, so I appreciate you having me on.

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