Branding Is About Cutting To The Flawless Center
Michael Grossman • April 1, 2019
The famed jeweler Harry Winston was such a stickler for perfection that after purchasing the 143-carat Star of Sierra Leone diamond, he announced he would cleave away the slight flaws and imperfections, which was a risky maneuver that caused apoplexy among diamond connoisseurs. Not easily deterred, Winston picked up his mallet and struck one of the largest gems of the world, and after the operation, he had a stone which was only one-fifth the size of the original, but because it was flawless, the value far surpassed that of the original rock. Metaphor translation: at the core of your bran is a unique and perfect center.
Cut To The Core To Find Your Brand
First, let’s start with what’s NOT at the core of your brand:
- What your company does to make money
- How you produce whatever it is you sell
- How long you’ve been in business
- Iconography
- A website or any marketing material
These are all things you do, but they aren’t the things that makeup who you are or why your customers choose you. Modes of operation change as does ownership and technologies. That’s why while some of these things might represent your brand, they will never be at the core of your brand.
So What’s A Brand?
Anyone can Google the term “brand,” but here’s how a few of the experts have defined it:
1. Branding is the art of aligning what you want people to think about your company with what people actually do think about your company. And vice-versa. Jay Baer
2. A brand is a reason to choose. Cheryl Burgess
3. Brand is the sum total of how someone perceives a particular organization. Branding is about shaping that perception. Ashley Friedlein
4. A brand is the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another. Seth Godin
While they use different words, you get the idea; it’s about what’s true, meaningful and distinct about your company and the perceptions people hold about it.
How Do I Figure Out My Brand?
This Venn Diagram demonstrates the integrated elements of a brand. If you’re not ready to hire a branding and marketing strategist, here are some questions you can ask your team to help you discover your core reason for being. 
True To The Brand
- What is our mission ?
- What is our vision ?
- What are our core values ?
- What’s our personification ?
Meaningful To The Customer
- What are the functional benefits the customer gets from your product?
- What are the emotional benefits the customer feels when interacting with your company or product?
- What is it your customer is expressing about himself/herself by purchasing your product or working with your company?
Distinctive From The Competition
- What are the key factors customers use to distinguish businesses within the industry, i.e., price, exclusivity, quality, customer service, prestige, power, trust, etc.?
- What perceptions do your competitors own?
- What perceptions do you own?
Once you’ve answered all of those questions, see if you can keep chipping away at the slight flaws until you get down to most fundamental and valuable state in one sentence or less.
For example, Disney might value teamwork and customer service, but their core reason for being is using imagination to bring people happiness. As a consequence, everything they do puts creativity at the forefront, and that’s what millions have come to expect from the Disney brand. Yes, Disney produces movies, TV shows and runs theme parks, but that’s what they do. Their essence is about using the imaginary world to bring these things to life, and regardless of the format, Disney will always use imagination to make people happy.
When you’re ready, put your unique value proposition up against some of the most luminescent brands in the world. If you’re still confused or reaching a dead end, email me for a free 30-minute consultation, and we’ll see if we can make you shine.
The post Branding Is About Cutting To The Flawless Center appeared first on Michael's Marc.
Denmark leads on climate—but even there, utility-scale solar is facing backlash. The community fault lines around clean energy projects worldwide can be overcome.
Clean energy developers do not lose projects because their technology fails. They lose projects because they misunderstand how decisions get made in the communities where those projects are proposed. If you spend enough time around project development, you start to see the same pattern. A site pencils. The resource is there. Interconnection works. Capital is lined up. Then the project enters the public process and something shifts. Opposition forms. Local officials hesitate. The project stalls or disappears. That outcome is not rare. Roughly one out of every three large clean energy projects in the United States never reaches construction . At the same time, the environment around these projects is getting harder. Research from the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University tracks hundreds of renewable energy projects across dozens of states facing organized opposition, along with a growing number of local laws restricting development. Across the country, local resistance is no longer episodic. It is structural. Most developers respond by trying to improve how they explain their projects. That is not where the problem sits. The most common messaging mistake clean energy developers make is this: They treat communication as explanation when it is actually coalition building. The Illusion Of Stakeholder Engagement Developers often approach communication by identifying “stakeholders” and building a plan to engage them. The list is familiar. Elected officials, regulators, adjacent landowners, business groups. Those people matter, but they are not the community. Communities are not organized through formal roles. They are organized through trust . Influence sits with people who do not appear on stakeholder maps. A pastor, a co-op manager, a respected farmer, a small business owner. These are the people others listen to when they are deciding what a project means. When engagement is limited to formal stakeholders, developers miss the informal networks where opinions actually form. That gap is where opposition gains ground. Developers Try To Be The Messenger Even when developers engage early, they often assume they should be the ones delivering the message. They have the data. They understand the project. They can explain the benefits. That logic makes sense internally. It is less effective externally. People trust those who share their lived experience . A developer entering from outside the community is asking for trust before it exists. A local voice does not need to make that same ask. This is not a communications nuance. It is the difference between being heard and being discounted. Projects that move forward tend to have credible local voices who can explain the project in terms that make sense to their neighbors. Projects that fail often rely on the developer to carry that burden alone. What is actually at stake These dynamics are easy to underestimate because they are not reflected in financial models. A utility-scale wind or solar project in the 50 to 100 megawatt range typically requires $75 million to $200 million in upfront capital, depending on technology, location, and interconnection costs. Over a 20 to 30 year lifespan, those projects can generate hundreds of millions of dollars in contracted revenue, particularly when backed by long-term power purchase agreements. When a project fails at the permitting stage, that capital is not redeployed cleanly. Time is lost. Development costs are written off. Market windows close. This is not a marginal issue. It is a core risk to the business model. The New Pressure: Data Centers The stakes are rising because demand is rising. The rapid growth of artificial intelligence and cloud computing is driving a surge in data center development across the United States. These facilities require enormous and continuous electricity loads. Recent analysis from Pew Research Center notes that data center electricity consumption in the U.S. is expected to increase significantly as AI adoption expands, placing new pressure on regional grids. At the same time, research from Columbia Business School highlights a growing race to secure power for these facilities, with developers competing for access to clean and reliable electricity. Additional analysis from Environmental and Energy Study Institute warns that data center demand is already reshaping grid planning and could complicate climate goals if new supply does not come online fast enough. This creates a collision. On one side, data center developers need large volumes of electricity, increasingly from low-carbon sources. On the other, local opposition is making it harder to build the very projects required to meet that demand. The result is a tightening constraint on both infrastructure and timelines. Coalition Building As A Development Function In this environment, coalition building is not a communications add-on. It is a core development function. Projects that succeed tend to follow a different sequence. They identify credible local voices early. They invest time in understanding how the project intersects with local concerns. They allow the community to shape how the project is discussed rather than introducing a fully formed narrative late in the process. This work often happens before a project is publicly announced. It rarely appears in investor updates. It is difficult to quantify. It is also one of the clearest predictors of whether a project moves forward. A Different Way To Think About Messaging If you treat messaging as explanation, your goal is clarity. You want people to understand what the project is and why it matters. If you treat messaging as coalition building, your goal is different. You are working to ensure that when the project becomes public, there are already trusted voices within the community who understand it, can speak to it, and see a place for it. That shift changes everything. It changes who speaks. It changes when conversations begin. It changes how opposition is received. The Broader Implication The clean energy transition is often framed as a technological and financial challenge. Those elements matter. Progress on both has been significant. At the same time, the growing number of local restrictions, the scale of organized opposition, and the surge in electricity demand from data centers point to a different constraint. The limiting factor is not always whether a project can be built. It is whether a community is prepared to accept it. Developers who recognize that early and build coalitions accordingly get projects built. Developers who do not often find themselves trying to explain a project after the decision has already been made.
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Learn why many clean energy projects fail before construction. Local opposition, permitting risk, and public narrative shape outcomes more than technology.
The Quiet Crisis in Clean Energy Development The United States is experiencing a permitting crisis for renewable energy projects. Between 2018 and 2023, roughly 30% of utility-scale wind and solar projects were canceled during the siting process, often because of local opposition or zoning restrictions. At the same time, opposition is spreading rapidly across the country. Researchers tracking renewable project conflicts have documented: • 498 contested renewable projects across 49 states • 459 counties and municipalities with severe restrictions on renewable development In other words, the challenge facing clean energy deployment is not primarily technological. It is political and social. When a Wind Project Dies Last week, a county commission in Washington State placed a moratorium on new wind energy development. That decision effectively halted the Harvest Hills Wind Project, a project proposed by Vestas, one of the most experienced wind companies in the world. The turbines themselves were not controversial from an engineering standpoint. Wind power is now one of the most mature energy technologies in the global power system. Yet the project still collapsed. The reason lies in the way public opinion forms around infrastructure projects. The New Reality of Local Politics Developers now operate in a communications environment where information spreads instantly and credibility is fragmented. Anyone with a social media account can claim expertise. Algorithms amplify outrage. And misinformation circulates faster than technical explanations. Even claims that wind turbines cause cancer — a theory repeatedly debunked by medical researchers — continue to appear in local debates. Once that narrative spreads within a community, the formal permitting process often becomes the stage for a conflict that has already been decided informally. Why the Old Engagement Model Fails The traditional developer playbook looks transparent on paper: 1. Announce the project 2. Launch a website with a project overview and FAQ 3. Invite residents to public meetings But when residents encounter the project for the first time through zoning notices or political social media posts, the project feels imposed rather than understood. By the time formal stakeholder engagement begins, the conversation often starts from mistrust. Farmers Understand the Problem Most wind and solar projects are located in rural areas. Farmers in those communities know something developers sometimes overlook: You prepare the soil before planting the seed. A farmer who plants before the soil is ready wastes the crop. Community engagement works the same way. If developers wait until a project is announced to begin outreach, the ground is already hardened. Grassroots Outreach Is Cheap Insurance Large energy projects often cost hundreds of millions of dollars, yet communications budgets for those projects are frequently minimal. True grassroots outreach typically costs less than one percent of project value, yet it can determine whether the project survives local politics. That outreach must reach residents where they already gather online: • Pre-roll ads on YouTube • Facebook and Instagram • Twitter/X (yes, even Twitter, because it's still a home for political junkies) • Streaming audio like Spotify and Pandora These platforms allow developers to communicate long before the permitting process begins. Projects Are About People Most renewable project websites emphasize infrastructure. Turbine height. Generation capacity. Interconnection details. Tax base. Those facts matter, but they rarely build trust. Communities want to know something simpler: How does this benefit me? Who in our community supports this? In rural areas, credibility travels through relationships. Residents trust farmers, business owners, and local leaders far more than corporate statements. A project website dominated by technical diagrams tells one story. A project website featuring community voices tells another. A Model That Worked Washington State’s Clean Fuel Standard faced intense opposition from the oil industry, but the policy ultimately passed because our team built a broad coalition before the final legislative fight began. That coalition included communities environmental campaigns often overlook: timber workers, minority businesses, and farmers, who were often the target of oil industry hysterics about gas prices. We spent months educating those communities before asking them to take action. When the opposition campaign intensified, the coalition already existed. The Future of Project Development Clean energy developers have historically thought of themselves as engineering organizations. In today’s political environment, they must also think like community organizers. That means: • Beginning outreach before project announcements • Engaging entire communities, not just formal stakeholders • Communicating through digital channels where residents already gather • Elevating trusted local voices The energy transition depends on infrastructure. But infrastructure ultimately depends on trust.
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A brand is not your logo. It’s not your color palette. It’s not your typography. It’s not your tagline. A brand is your voice and your story. The most beautifully designed logo in the world is irrelevant if there isn’t a narrative beneath it—one that carries meaning across platforms, resonates with a specific audience, and communicates why your company exists. In cleantech, this distinction matters more than founders often realize. Because when your product is complex, technical, and capital-intensive, your brand becomes the bridge between your science and your market. A Logo Without Meaning Is Just a Shape Many early-stage companies invest in visual identity before investing in narrative clarity, as if you aren’t a real company until you have a logo, debating colors, symbols, and typography without answering the fundamental questions: • Who do we serve? • What problem do we solve? • Why does it matter now? • Why are we uniquely positioned to win? Creating a logo without answering the above questions first reminds me of the famous line from Alice in Wonderland: “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” Research supports this distinction. According to the Nielsen Norman Group – Brand Credibility and User Perception , users form judgments about credibility based on the clarity of the message and its relevance—not purely on visual design. Visual polish without substance may attract attention, but it does not sustain trust. In other words, aesthetics are secondary to meaning. A logo is a symbol. Symbols only matter when they represent something meaningful. Nike: A Logo That Carries a Story Consider Nike. The swoosh is one of the most recognizable logos in the world. It is minimal. Clean. Uncomplicated. But the swoosh alone does not create emotional impact. Nike has spent decades pairing that logo with a consistent narrative: you can be the best version of yourself. The logo tells athletes—and non-athletes alike—that they can fly. Nike does not lead with rubber compounds or stitching technology. They lead with aspiration. Their campaigns reinforce belief. The logo has remained stable, but the company has invested billions in associating it with performance, resilience, identity, and ambition. Brand equity research confirms why this works. According to McKinsey & Company – The Value of Getting Brand Building Right , companies that consistently reinforce a clear, emotionally resonant brand story outperform peers in long-term growth and pricing power. The swoosh works because the story works. Cleantech Is Technical—But It’s Also Aspirational Cleantech founders sometimes resist branding comparisons to consumer companies. “We’re not selling shoes.” “We’re selling grid storage.” “We’re building carbon capture systems.” That’s true. But you are still selling transformation. You are selling: • Energy resilience • Regulatory compliance • Cost stability • Operational continuity • Emissions reduction • Long-term viability These outcomes are aspirational. Cleantech may be technical, but the impact it delivers is planet-altering. That emotional weight is powerful—if you communicate it clearly. Research from Edelman Trust Barometer 2024 shows that trust in companies is driven heavily by clarity of purpose and perceived long-term commitment—not product features alone. Your brand must communicate belief, not just capability. Generic Taglines Signal Generic Positioning Now consider the tagline problem. Cleantech websites are full of statements like: • “Powering a Sustainable Future.” • “Driving the Transition to Net Zero.” • “Innovating for a Greener Tomorrow.” Each one sounds polished. Mission-driven. Serious. Each one is also interchangeable. If five companies can use the same tagline without modification, it is not a strategic differentiator. It is a category filler. Strong brands communicate specificity. According to Harvard Business Review – Competing on Customer Experience , companies that articulate clearly how they solve a defined customer problem outperform those relying on vague mission-driven messaging. A tagline should drive the audience to an obvious conclusion: This company is one of one. If your tagline does not signal: • Who you serve • What you solve • Why it matters • Why you are uniquely positioned Then it is not strengthening your brand. It is simply occupying space. Branding Is Strategic Positioning Branding is not decoration. It is positioning. Positioning answers: • Who this is for • Who this is NOT for • What problem do you solve? • Why can't competitors replicate you? • What belief anchors your work? Without that clarity, your brand defaults to comparison. And comparison often defaults to price. Research from Boston Consulting Group – The Power of Brand in B2B confirms that even in technical B2B industries, strong brands command pricing premiums and reduce perceived risk. Cleantech is no exception. If your brand doesn’t signal differentiation, the market will evaluate you on cost. That is a race you do not want to run. Voice Is the Core of Brand Consistency If branding is more than a logo, what defines it? Voice! Voice shows up in: • Website copy • Investor decks • Sales sheets • LinkedIn posts • White papers • Conference presentations If your voice changes across platforms, your brand fractures. If your executive team describes the company differently from your sales team, your brand weakens. Branding is a narrative discipline. Nike’s swoosh works because the story is reinforced everywhere. Your cleantech company does not need a billion-dollar ad budget. But it does need message consistency across platforms. Consistency builds familiarity. Familiarity builds trust. Trust accelerates decisions. Your Brand Should Make the Audience the Hero One of the most common branding mistakes in cleantech is positioning the company as the hero. “We are saving the planet.” “We are transforming energy.” “We are redefining sustainability.” That sounds ambitious. But it centers the company, not the audience. A stronger brand narrative positions the customer as the hero and your company as the guide. Instead of: “We power a sustainable future.” Consider: “We help industrial operators reduce compliance risk without sacrificing uptime.” Now the buyer sees themselves. Branding must create recognition before admiration. If Your Logo Disappeared Tomorrow, Would Your Story Survive? A useful test: If your logo disappeared tomorrow, would your audience still understand who you serve and why you matter? If the answer is no, your branding is surface-level. A strong brand survives without a visual identity because the story carries it. Nike’s swoosh matters because of decades of narrative reinforcement. Your cleantech brand must stand on narrative clarity first—and design second. Final Thoughts Branding is more than a logo. It is more than a tagline. It is the story that undergirds your visual identity and carries it across every platform. A logo is a symbol. A tagline is a signal. But your brand is the belief that ties them together. Cleantech solves technical problems with planetary implications. That is not small work. Your brand should reflect that scale—not through vague mission language, but through clear positioning and meaningful narrative. The strongest brands do not win because they are the prettiest. They win because they mean something. If your tagline could belong to anyone, it belongs to no one. And if your logo does not represent a defined belief shared with your audience, it is just a shape. Build the story first. Then let the symbol carry it.
Cleantech companies love white papers. They love technical briefs. They love dense PDFs packed with charts, tables, and footnotes. Unfortunately, your audience doesn’t consume information that way anymore. If your marketing strategy still treats video as optional—or something you’ll “get to later”—you’re actively choosing to be invisible in the places that matter most. This isn’t a creative preference. It’s a distribution reality. And the data is unambiguous. Your Audience Is on YouTube—Whether You Like It or Not Every year, Pew Research Center releases its survey on how Americans use social media. And every year, the results reinforce the same conclusion: YouTube dominates. According to Pew Research Center – Americans’ Social Media Use 2025 , YouTube is the most widely used platform across every major demographic category: • Age • Gender • Education level • Household income • Political affiliation • Urban vs. rural Nearly half of all YouTube users report visiting the platform daily. No other platform comes close to that level of reach and consistency. So when cleantech founders ask whether they should be producing video, the better question is: Why would you avoid the one platform your audience already uses? “Because That’s Where the Money Is” There’s an old story about the bank robber Willie Sutton. When asked why he robbed banks, he famously replied: “Because that’s where the money is.” The same logic applies here. YouTube isn’t just another social platform. It’s where your buyers, investors, partners, regulators, and future hires already spend time. They go there to learn, to research, and to understand complex topics—exactly the kind of topics cleantech companies work on. If you’re not there, someone else is explaining your category for you. And you may not like how they’re doing it. Cleantech Is Complex— Video Reduces Friction Cleantech products are rarely simple. They involve infrastructure, policy, science, operations, and long-term outcomes. Asking someone to understand that through text alone is a heavy lift. Video lowers the barrier. A two-minute explainer video can do what ten pages of copy often can’t: • Define the problem • Show empathy • Differentiate your solution • Demonstrate scale • Establish credibility • Humanize your team • Reduce perceived risk This matters because buying cleantech solutions isn’t about impulse—it’s about confidence. Video builds confidence faster than any other format. YouTube Is Not Social Media—It’s the Second Largest Search Engine One of the most misunderstood aspects of YouTube is that it’s not primarily a “social” platform. It’s a discovery engine. Google has confirmed repeatedly that YouTube functions as the world’s second-largest search engine. People don’t just scroll—they search. According to Google – How People Use Video to Make Decisions , users increasingly rely on video to evaluate products, understand services, and validate purchasing decisions—especially for high-consideration industries. That describes cleantech perfectly. When someone searches: • “How anaerobic digesters work” • “Is RNG profitable” • “Utility-scale battery storage risks” • “How to reduce methane emissions” They’re not looking for marketing copy. They’re looking for explanation. If your company isn’t providing that explanation, someone else will. Video Builds Trust Faster Than Text Trust is the limiting factor in cleantech adoption. Buyers aren’t just evaluating performance—they’re evaluating you. They want to know: • Do you understand their problem? • Can you explain it clearly? • Do you seem credible? • Will you still be here in five or ten years? Video answers these questions instantly. Seeing your engineers, leadership team, or operators speak confidently about the work creates familiarity. Familiarity reduces risk. Reduced risk accelerates decisions. Research from Edelman – Trust and Technology Special Report shows that audiences are significantly more likely to trust companies that communicate transparently and visibly, especially in emerging technology sectors. Video is the fastest way to do that. Nearly All Internet Traffic Is Becoming Video This trend isn’t slowing down—it’s accelerating. According to Cisco – Annual Internet Report , video accounts for the majority of global internet traffic and continues to grow year over year. That means: • More people are consuming video • Platforms are prioritizing video • Text-only content is losing distribution power If your cleantech marketing strategy is still built around written content alone, you’re swimming against the current. ________________________________________ Video Doesn’t Replace Written Content—It Multiplies It This is where many founders misunderstand the role of video. Producing video doesn’t mean abandoning blogs, reports, or white papers. It means creating a content engine. One video can be: • A YouTube upload • A LinkedIn clip • A website explainer • A sales enablement asset • A conference follow-up • A blog transcript • A press resource Video gives you leverage. Instead of writing ten separate pieces of content, you produce one strong video and distribute it everywhere your audience already is. That’s efficiency—not extra work. What Types of Video Actually Work for Cleantech This is not about flashy production or viral trends. The most effective cleantech video content is: • Empathetic • Educational • Solutions-Based • Clear • Credible Examples that work consistently: • Benefits that address pain points • Short technical breakdowns • Founder or expert commentary • Project walk-throughs • Pilot results explanations • Market or policy context videos Clever videos are nice. Clear videos are better. The goal is reducing uncertainty. Video Supports Long Sales Cycles Cleantech sales cycles are long by nature. Video helps in ways text cannot: • Prospects can rewatch explanations • Internal champions can share videos upward • Investors can evaluate without meetings • Regulators can understand context faster Video becomes a silent sales partner—working when you’re not in the room. It also filters leads. People who take the time to watch your content are self-selecting as serious. That improves sales efficiency and reduces wasted conversations. The Real Risk Is Not Producing Video The biggest mistake cleantech companies make isn’t producing bad video. It’s producing none at all. When you avoid video: • Your competitors define the narrative • Your category is explained by outsiders • Your credibility is assumed instead of demonstrated • Your expertise stays hidden • Your brand feels distant and abstract Meanwhile, the competing companies that do produce video capture the visibility high ground for those seeking solutions in your niche. This Isn’t About Being Trendy—It’s About Being Visible Producing video content isn’t a marketing fad. It’s a response to how people now consume information. Your audience has already made the shift. The Pew data makes that clear. The internet traffic data confirms it. The trust research supports it. YouTube is where your audience is. As Willie Sutton might say— that’s where the opportunity is. Final Thoughts Cleantech companies don’t lose attention because their work isn’t important. They lose attention because they fail to communicate in the formats people actually use. Video is no longer optional. It’s no longer experimental. It’s no longer “nice to have.” It’s infrastructure. If you want your cleantech company to be understood, trusted, and taken seriously at scale, you must produce video content. Not because everyone else is doing it. But because that’s where your audience already is.
