You’ve been asked what you do a thousand times. And every single time, something clunky comes out.

Maybe you’ve tried to craft the perfect elevator pitch for three years and still don’t love any version of it. Maybe you’ve hired a copywriter who gave you something technically correct that somehow still missed the point. Maybe you just smile and say some version of what you do for your clients and watch the other person’s eyes immediately go blank.

The problem? You’re obsessing over the wrong question entirely.

The Trap That’s Keeping You Stuck

Every founder I talk to is doing a version of the same thing: trying to nail the perfect description of what they do. But the description isn’t your brand. On the surface, a graphic designer is a graphic designer is a graphic designer. Two coaches can offer the exact same service and attract completely different clients, not because of their packages, but because of who they are at their core and what drives them.

What differentiates you is what you stand for, what values drive you, and who you are as a person. When you’re clear on those things, the words follow. When you’re not, no amount of copywriting will fix it.

The real trap is skipping this work altogether.

So many brilliant founders get stuck because of the same root problem. They try to find the right words to describe what they do before they’ve actually developed a distinct point of view.

They over-explain and vomit out a word salad of nonsense, trying to stuff in every service and tactic they’ve ever offered. Or, they get vague: “I help people live their best life” says nothing to anyone. Or they lean on jargon, which might make them feel smart, but also says absolutely nothing.

And, I’m not gonna lie. AI has made this worse. If you’re using any tool to write your copy and not putting in sufficient work to scrub it of its inherent genericness, you’re using language that belongs to everyone and no one simultaneously. It’s bland and vanilla, and that ain’t connecting with anyone. 

Enter: Identity Pillars

Every client I work with starts in the same place: by defining their identity pillars. It doesn’t matter if they’re coming to me for branding, web design, content marketing, or coaching. We always begin with identity pillars because they’re the core of literally everything else in your business.

These aren’t those generic, meaningless brand values so many companies have adorning their About pages and office walls, like “Authentic,” “Quality,” “Community. Those words float in space, attached to no story or meaning, and so they stand for nothing. They just make corporations feel good about themselves.

But identity pillars have edges. They have context.

• “Authentic” means nothing. “I show up as my real self even when it’s messy,” on the other hand? That’s getting somewhere. Add the story of the time you did exactly that and now it means everything.
• “Quality” is empty and generic. “I went back and wrote another draft at midnight because the first one wasn’t sitting right” — that’s an identity pillar. It drives how you do your work.

When you lead with what you stand for, your ideal clients self-select. They see themselves in your content before they’ve even read your bio. And the wrong clients? They filter themselves out. That part is uncomfortable, but it’s supposed to be.

Last week I turned away a client I had been genuinely excited about — a female-led nonprofit doing work I believe in so deeply that I’ve donated to them personally. On paper, they seemed perfect. In the room, it became clear the founder wanted me to shrink myself, to give more for less, to abandon the things I know to be true about how this work gets done well. And I turned her away because my identity pillars don’t live on a document in the ether. They live in the room with me at every turn, and they made the decision to cut this client loose before I even had time to think about it.

I was sad and disappointed, but I was also so damn proud of myself.

That’s what real clarity feels like. It’s not always comfortable, but you can be damn sure it’s clear.

The Exercise That Starts to Crack It Open

You don’t need to work with me to begin this process. Grab a notebook and answer these questions honestly — not the way you think you “should” answer them, but a truly unfiltered brain dump:

• Why did you actually start this business? I want you to go way beneath those surface level answers around wanting freedom or to be your own boss. What was driving you toward this hard, uncertain path when staying employed would have been so much easier?
• What words come to mind when you think about what you stand for — as a human, not just as a brand?
• What do you believe about how this work should be done that most people in your industry don’t?

Brain dump your answers. Don’t edit while you write. Then, look for patterns and non-negotiables. You’re looking for five to six identity pillars that feel true no matter what you’re building, no matter who the client is. Those are your brand. Your messaging, your content, your positioning, and everything else builds from there.

This is our starting point for the Bold Content Collective, my 6-week content coaching program to help you build out your brand strategy, content strategy, and a plan for making your content consistent and effective for building your business.