Brand Story Strategy & the Importance of Nailing Your Messaging with Joanna Neale
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Growing businesses is Joanna’s passion. With a background in sales and business development, over the last 10 years she’s worked on more than four businesses or business ideas across construction, software, beauty and skincare.
And I’ve had the privilege of helping her.
In our 10 Years, 10 Stories chat, we spoke about my Brand Story Strategy Workshop and what it’s like inside, how important it is to get your messaging right, why listening to your customer is key to growing a successful business, and how it’s more important than ever to know who you’re working with.
Meet Joanna Neale
Relationship to me:
Client & Friend
Years we’ve known each other:
5+ years
Specialty:
Ideas, Business Development, Sales
What we’ve worked on:
Brand Story Strategy, Brand Tone of Voice, Branding, Content Creation, Brand & Marketing Strategy.
Interview Highlights
Meet Joanna
Growing businesses Jo’s passion, and throughout her career she’s grown quite a few successful businesses both for herself, and for other business owners.
There’s almost nothing she hasn’t learned about business from being on the ground floor getting it done. She’s got experience in B2B and B2C sales, product development, marketing, account management, brand management, business systems, technology, operations, building and managing a team, account management, business development and the customer journey from lead generation to delivery.
And she’s worked across a wide range of industries from construction and beauty, to software and travel.
Jo and I met through a networking group we were both members of. Since then, she’s given me the privilege of working with her to grow several of her brands.
Our favourite project we’ve worked on together…
I’ve delivered more than one brand story strategy for Jo in a one-on-one capacity.
But recently, we worked together inside my Brand Story Strategy Workshop, where Jo participated in group coaching, and with my guidance, did most of the grunt work to build a Brand Story Strategy for her latest project (a skincare range).
And Jo loved it.
She said –
“In that group setting, not only did we get your wealth of knowledge and the system that you put in place to really have a beautiful sort of progression with how that brand story develops, but we also had this incredible group of intelligent people and business owners and entrepreneurs that we could bounce off and the ideas and the dialogue.”
What we love most about working together…
One of the things I love most about working with Jo is that she puts in the work.
Whatever it is I ask of her, she gets it done. Despite the fact that she’s a self-confessed ideas person who doesn’t like to get too bogged down in the detail!
We have a lot of fun working together. It’s creative and vibrant and over the years we have built a really strong understanding of how we best collaborate together.
Jo says –
“You are genius, fun and professional.
Amey, working with you over the years from a client perspective has been incredible. You have the ability to breathe life into a brand.
You take time to understand both the business you are working with, their offering and client and infuse it into brand story and brand strategies that are authentic and impactful.”
What Joanna thinks will change for business in the next 10 years…
Jo believes that clear, authentic, articulate communication will be critical for businesses who want to grow in the next 10 years.
She says –
“A lot of people are competing in the same spaces.
So people who know their audience, speak to their audience, listen to their audience, and then write copy and communication and brand strategy based on their audience – [they] will be the ones that will come out with the most authentic and the clearest voice.
Everything else will be just a rehash of what ChatGPT spits out.
Remembering that ChatGPT is being trained by opinions, not by facts. And so it's just going to be a rehash of the same thing. People are going to sound like robots. [But] the people who are following instructions like yours [implementing Brand Story Strategy] will actually be sounding like authentic people.”
Key Interview Insight
Clear, authentic, articulate communication will be the number one thing that differentiates a business that gets lost in the noise, or a business that becomes iconic.
- Joanna
About the 10 Years, 10 Stories Interview Series
This interview is one of a series of ten interviews I did in 2024, with ten people who have impacted my business journey throughout my ten years in business.
Each and every conversation full of insight, advice, memories and celebration.
