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☕️ a punch in the face, followed by a big hug
Published about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Q3, new me! Or better yet *more* of me.
Let’s unravel the reason behind my brand refresh:
You have to be okay with pissing some people off.
You have to sit with the discomfort of knowing you're trulynot for everybody.
Because in understanding that, you’re able to show up more as yourself.
You become less curated with your words. Your actions. Your style. Your mannerisms.
Essentially, you give fewer f*cks about how the general crowd perceives you because you know that while 80% of people might think you're ridiculous, 10% admire what you're doing and want to be part of it. And the other 10% are watching you simply because seeing you be unapologetically yourself gives them permission to do the same.
The alternative is spending your entire life editing yourself into someone more digestible.
And trust me, as a girl who has shape-shifted to fit a room more times than I care to admit - THAT is a f*cking exhausting way to live your life.
Funny enough, until my wedding wrapped up (lolz at the things that give you business epiphanies), I had felt pretty darn confident that my brand was 100% Marissa-ified.
And yes, in these emails and my social content where I’m yapping at ya straight from the heart?
Hard yes. That is 10000% me.
But if I’m being soooo honest, my ‘aesthetic’? My website? And overall visual identity?
That’s been trapped in the ‘almost but not quite’ Marissa abyss for far too long.
Because here’s the thanggg I didn’t fully see until I was re-watching all my wedding footage (props to my MOH’s speech that altered my brain chemistry) and started to put pieces together.
The girl who started this business believed she could be herself. But like…the version of herself that’s always been safe to share with the world.
I had been on autopilot of “this is the Marissa the public gets” and “this is the Marissa close friends get” for SO long that I didn’t even realize I was doing it.
It became my norm to hide the parts of my personality that everyone had always told me was f*cking weird. A little too much. A little too…Marissa.
But like… I am weird. 😂 I am a little out there.
My Marissa-isms don’t retreat when I work with my clients. If anything, they’re in full force.
Like hi…you pay for my brain and this is how it works…. now enjoyyyy!🫶
And this is the part that really gets me. Because most clients? Have THANKED ME for being this way. No, literally...look 👇
as I was drafting this email, I got this DM from a client and was like ‘ope, that’s getting included for proof LOL
My clients see “the real” Marissa and get the “close friends” type access because anything less wouldn’t get them the results they want.
So what better reason to rebrand than to stop treating “the weird” or the “blunt” parts like a subtle undertone and start letting it take up the space it deserves?
Because this business shouldn't just reflect part of who I am. It should reflect all of it.
And there's always been a duality to my personality.
There’s one half of me that has SO much heart, care, and will fight like hell for the people in my corner. And then there's the other half that's blunt, direct, and a little aggressive in the best way possible.
That’s the side that isn’t interested in sugarcoating the truth just to make it easier for you to swallow.
That’s the part that allows me to push the people I care about further.
When my brand designer asked me to describe my own personality, the words that came out of my mouth were "a punch in the face, followed by a big hug."
Because that's genuinely what it's like working with me (or just being my friend).
I'm going to say the hard thing. I probably won’t say it gently. And it’s probably the thing that if you look deep down, you already knew was true.
And once we've acknowledged the truth (this is where the hug part comes in), we’re strapping up our boots and getting to work, because you can bet your ass we’re gonna do something about it.
But in order to get there? I'm gonna smack ya in the face with reality, and I’m going to challenge you to think differently.
Yes, this all roots back to “the why” I’ve told you about a million times. My brother.
But the grittier parts that don’t get vocalized are how the “why” surfaces and actualizes.
Three core themes that lead me every damn day:
Persevering and refusing to quit, no matter how hard something seems in the moment
Absolute refusal to sleepwalk through life, settle, or go through the motions
Making sure the people around me also know how freaking capable they are to shape their lives and get after what they want
Is that a normal way to operate? Idk.
But it’s what built me. It’s what’s built this business.
And it leads to how I show up every damn day and serve my people.
That’s my brand, to its core.
It needs that duality I spoke about to exist.
And now that duality is finally embedded into every aspect of the brand. 😌
Just like making coffee, anyone can create content. But crafting crave-worthy content, much like a perfect pour-over, requires effort. Subscribers to the Content Pour-Over get weekly actionable insights to enhance their content through marketing psychology and brand strategy principles.
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