“Brand it to sell it”. If your work is conceptual it is sellable. A new direction was addressed where we learned that a story around a product or a service can do the magic to sell it at a better value proposition. A man who is a unique amalgamation of both the brains, left and right, a human who is both creatively and logically inclined. He is recognized for his professionalism in the field of Creative Marketing and for generating the finest Branding solutions.
“Just your school grades ain’t important but why-what-how reasoning is the key to your decisive future and career.,” says a puissant Bhavik. Being a below-average student in school still, Bhavik knew he can have a great career outside academics. This mindset led him to explore branding and marketing and how it can be helpful for not just him but others too. An enthusiastic Bhavik kept exploring himself and kept going with the flow. This inspirational man taught us that your grades do not define you as a person but how you take failures and how tackle them for a better result makes you a winner for life. Whilst spending time in this maze of exploration, Bhavik realized that he retained a unique hobby, the gift of gab and storytelling. Way to go! Without giving a second thought to this, Bhavik entered this whole new habitat of how storytelling can help you in making creative sales.
Bhavik’s father owned a sweet shop whose operations didn’t interest him but its marketing did. Instead, he stepped out and got into Thinkin Birds where he helped hospitality brands, the ones like his father’s. After this first success of Mehta’s son, Bhavik and his family found warmth in this new ray of hope and for Bhavik it was his first little stepping stone towards filling the colors of success in his rainbow.
Further talking about his journey, with this unique gift of speech, Bhavik commenced teaching marketing to BBA, BCCA, and MBA students. His father was his idol and role model, and from him, he derived an interest in the art of business. Bhavik changed his gears onto the road of business, where on his journey he realized that
If you can brand it, you can sell it.
This thought led to the birth of ‘Thinkin Birds’.
Thinkin Birds has been working as a design and branding agency for over eight years, and retaining the satisfaction of over three hundred brands in their clientele. As Bhavik likes to say, “The ‘g’ in Thinkin’ Birds stands for grievance.” He has been the Brand Chief at Thinkin’ Birds and also an abetment to more than ninety National and International hospitality brands for ten and more years. As an expert in conceptualization and the creation of brand identities, he has also pioneered the concept of creative sales and has been an ex- marketing faculty for over twelve years now.
Talking about the Art of Selling, Bhavik said that “You cannot sell right if you are unable to deliver the right stories” He further elaborated by saying, sales are about inspiration, sales are about the story you build around it. The art of weaving a story around the brand and selling it is the talent that Bhavik retains.
We soon struck a new conversation about selling brand identities and how we would make people understand the value of the brand identity. Brand identity is not just a logo but a comprehensive sense of creating a language of a brand through the brand guide, its color palette, fonts, and elements around it making its universal usability to make the client understand the reason behind the investment they are making. Any design agency must build branding that conveys the message that they stand for. Further adding to this conversation of achieving value proposition, Bhavik explained how important it is to understand a client’s buying behavior and psychology.
Bhavik told us that it is important for us to use the term ‘Investment’ over ‘Budget’ because after all, a logo is the identity of a company and therefore an investment for them. Sales are never an immediate process, it may even take days or months to close a sale successfully.
It is very necessary to understand a client’s perspective. It’s an impetus trait freelancers and agencies should consider during negotiations.
Bhavik helped us understand how necessary it is to build relations with your clients and how to solve problems through your services for strong business partnerships. He quoted, “Make long-term relations for the longer business association”. Bhavik also shared that when you align a client’s vision and emotion and make it yours too then it’s a win-win for both the parties.
Bhavik says, human resources around us are like business cards and therefore you need to deal with them carefully. An important lesson learned was that we should agree to a service where we can deliver a hundred percent justice. “Don’t sell, help the client instead” says Bhavik.
In this vast field of design, design needs to be the main ingredient of the work you deliver. “ No matter how aesthetic a restaurant is, you would never step into it again if it does not deliver taste” was an example quoted by Bhavik where he taught us that we should not compromise on our quality of design for the price.
Money should never be the factor for you to work towards your designs.
Invest a huge amount of time in developing a concept for your design. An agency or a freelancer gets business for the concept and not just design.“Design is free, concept brings you all the money. “The turnaround time and prompt communication is the essence for a long term business relation”, shared Bhavik Mehta.
Bhavik was asked how did he develop this skill of making and maintaining relations, he answered beautifully saying that he is a people person and his team at Thinkin Birds is his family. Bhavik refers to his workspace as a nest. Birds when they grow up leave the nest and fly away, but the nest of Thinkin Birds seems different. Bhavik proudly claims that the birds at our nest are here to stay and fly high together. The connection that Bhavik has built with his team and clients helps him cherish his journey of success.
A man with mountains of enthusiasm left us all feeling so motivated and inspiring. “You can do anything you want, chase your dreams and nothing shall stop you” Build your own nest!
