My top 3 tips to easily (and fabulously) brand your wellness business

You may not know this, but up until I was 16, no one called me Victoria.

To be clear, Victoria is my first name.

But from birth until 16, I went by my middle name…Ashlee.

It feels strange to even write it, but if you come visit me in Paducah, Kentucky where I grew up, you’ll hear a lot of people call me Ashlee.

So, what happened?

How did I become Victoria?

Around 16, I figured out I could sing. Like, really, really sing.

Like opera music sing.

And Kentucky happens to be one of only a handful of states that offers a free art program for high schoolers.

I’m not talking about some piddly macaroni art-style day classes.

I mean full-on, you have to audition and brave stiff competition, best teachers in the country, you’re going to stay up late practicing, residential arts program.

And y’all, I got in.

After a few lessons with my mom’s high school friend (who just happened to be a fantastic music teacher at the university an hour away) and cramming Italian I could barely pronounce (much less understand) into my teenage brain, I learned an aria and auditioned and got in.

I was thrilled beyond words.

For me, Governor’s School for the Arts was more than an art school.

It was an eye-opening look at what was possible outside the confines of “Ashlee” and high school and being the weird kid.

To this day, I don’t know what possessed me to introduce myself to my new artsy friends as Victoria, but it felt right.

I embarked upon what we in the marketing world like to call…a rebrand.

Branding myself as Victoria was life-changing.

What’s so important about a name?

Well, it meant something.

Victoria holds some power on its own (victory, victorious, victor…Victoria!), but changing my name was an action that marked my creativity and autonomy.

I was able to drop the heavy doubt and insecurity that had clouded most of my childhood and become something new.

I was able to set the terms, the personality, and the vibe of this new experience as Victoria.

I could create myself from scratch and experience life through the boundaries of someone who wore what she wanted, said what she thought, and unapologetically presented herself in a completely different way.

And the crossover here is that the brand you create for your practice should achieve these exact same objectives.

Branding tip #1: Make it meaningful

As with every ounce of advice I have regarding your practice, I urge you to make it meaningful.

Why?

Because getting your practice going will be one of the hardest tasks of your life.

So to stick with it, your brand has to mean something to you.

And it has to create a bond with your potential customers.

Let your brand reflect who you are, what matters, why you’re doing this, and yes, your aesthetic.

So stop hiding—show up and let people know who you are.

Here’s an example: The background story of the photo above is that I’m working with a fantastic photographer in my hometown of Paducah, KY. 

I’m wearing my grandmother’s earrings (yeah, she was a total badass), a t-shirt portraying my fave cartoon character (Prismo from Adventure Time), and my favorite thrifted suit (it was only ten bucks!).

I’m sporting a red lip because, y’all, I LOVE a red lip.

And my beautiful mom is just off-camera, making me laugh.

I based my brand aesthetic on this photoshoot—hot pink, blue/black, and creamy white are my color palette.

The mix of funky backgrounds and red lipstick.

Cartoon t-shirt and sassy, second-hand suit.

Involving my family at every step.

And that’s not just me…it’s what matters to me and how I do business. I want my potential clients to know from the start: This is the vibe you’ll be working with.

So…what do you stand for?

What do you love?

What brings you peace and joy?

What scares the shit out of you?

You have to infuse your business with these (sometimes silly & embarrassing but highly meaningful) bits of yourself because guess what?

Your patients experience these silly & embarrassing bits, too. 

And when we fully show up, they fully show up.

Now, to be clear, your marketing must be centered on potential patients.

That’s why I recommend digging deep into your ideal client avatar and speaking to them on your homepage, in your blogs, and even when you share your story. 

But you gotta be there, too. Full stop.

Without you and your vision and mission, your business will be lackluster, vague, unmemorable…and easy to quit. 

So, put your spin on wellness. What makes your business YOURS?

Branding tip #2: Make it unique

Tip number two relates to tip number one in that the same spark that makes your brand meaningful will also make it unique.

I’m here to tell you: Unique is RARE.

It’s standout.

It’s interesting as hell. And highly appealing.

No one, and I mean no one, wants to hang out on another slipshod, muted-color website written in the bored tone of a CBD-stoned yoga instructor.

People crave something new, trusthworthy but interesting, and authentic.

Your name, tagline, logo, colors, and messaging can and should be different from every other clinician on the block.

Now, this isn’t to say you should abandon tried-and-true user experience strategies like easy-to-see buttons with clear calls to action or fonts big enough for your niche audience to read (if you’re marketing to people over 50, increase that font size, honey!).

But it is saying you can use hot pink in your color palette.

You can wear your favorite T-shirt in your headshots.

You can write a headline that, in your brand voice, makes people stop and take action instead of scrolling on by.

To be clear, finding the “just right” voice and vibe of your brand takes time. But better to push the limits and go too far than never fully showing up.

Branding tip #3: Make it unapologetic

Once you’ve found your brand’s sweet spot, don’t sway.

Your brand will not be the right fit for some people.

Great! THOSE AREN’T YOUR PEOPLE.

Do you think everyone’s ok with us publishing the word “bullshit” on our homepage?

They certainly are not.

But our customers, the people who want what we offer and who we love working with, routinely tell us how much they resonate with our messaging.

So, once you have a feel-it-in-your-bones mission, brand, and messaging, don’t dull it down, and don’t look back.

This brings up a great question: How do you know when you’re there? When your brand is fully cooked, so to speak?

For me, it was a feeling.

It felt right…like I had finally found the perfect balance of my personality and passions with the professional objectives I could most integrally offer the world. Click here to read our full origin story.

Honestly, it took some heartache and stops and starts to get there, but once those factors aligned, everything else fell into place.

It didn’t feel scary anymore.

It felt liberating and right to lean into a brand that amplified that message—supporting evidence-based clinicians with SEO—as loudly as possible.

Need support with your brand & messaging?

You don’t have to change your name, I promise.

Click here to start a free 7-day trial of our monthly marketing membership, a robust, community-based membership of badass clinicians who support each other with lots of excellent marketing strategies (and plenty of love).