To Brand or Not to Brand?: Marketing Your Yoga Business

Defining Your “Brand”

The word brand is usually synonymous with a product, and one that has an original, reliable and well-defined offering. Nike trainers make you run faster, Fairy Liquid keeps your hands soft and Red Bull gives you wings, that sort of thing. How can this apply to yoga given that we are people, and not products? There are a number of more helpful definitions, but this is my favorite:

• It’s what people say about you when you are not in the room.
• It’s the promise of an experience.

And here’s the rub: given that yoga is a highly experiential activity, students will attach as much, if not more, importance to the ‘feeling’ they get from a teacher or a studio as they would to other practical considerations like cost or location. – Jules Barber

Choosing Not to Worry About a Brand Strategy

My personal feeling is that setting up a brand strategy is the last thing you should worry about as a new or freelance teacher. The reason I say this is because most teachers who try to brand their style of yoga think that all they need to do is come up with a clever name and start a Facebook fan page or website in order to have a brand. The main issue is that most teachers don’t have a clear reason for setting up a brand. – Erin Aquin