Building a brand should be an integral part of any business plan as it can be the differentiating factor between your success and failure. Branding is often associated with a logo, a colour scheme or slogan, but really, it is much much more than these components. A brand is an entire experience your customers and potential customers have with your company and offering, be it a product or service.
“Your brand is the single most important investment you can make in your business.”
— Steve Forbes, Editor-in-Chief of Forbes magazine
Your brand represents your values and personality and unlike your business, belongs to the customer because it depends so much on perception and reputation. In building a brand, there are some important factors to consider:
1. Who is your brand for? It is best to narrow down your target audience.?
The more specific you are, the more on-point you’ll be when it comes to creating a service or product that will provide a solution and a message that will resonate. In identifying your target audience, you should focus on demographics, education level and economic segment. If you try to be everything to everyone, your offering could easily get lost in the noise.
2. Create a brand mission statement. This should summarise the core of your offering while reflecting your values. This will give your brand more depth than just an association with a range of products.
3. Decide where your brand will position itself in the market. Look at your competitors. Where do you see your brand in relation to them?
4. Create a shortlist of up to 6 characteristics your brand should be. Is it elegant? Cool? Edgy? This list will form the foundation of your brand identity.
5. Solidify your brand identity. Your brand identity is composed of a logo, slogan, colour palette. It can also include associated iconography, photography and lead to physical and digital assets such as stationery, brochures and a website.
6. Find your voice. If your brand was a person, what tone would they use in expressing their message? This will set the tone of all communication activities made by the company across channels such as your website, company literature and social media platforms.
7. Write your brand message. This should consist of no more than a few sentences to present who you are, what you do, and why people should know about you.
8. Create your brand world. This could be in the physical or online realm. If it is both, one should reflect the other.
9. Create a content plan. Your brand content could run across many forms of media: a blog, newsletters, magazines, photography, videography and social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook. Consistency is more important than frequency so make sure that this plan is one that you can realistically keep up with while you attend to all the other tasks required in building your business.
10. Bring your brand to the right people through a strategic marketing campaign. This may include activities such as advertising, SEO, events, PR and direct marketing.
These are ten building blocks we find very useful in helping our clients build their brands, and we hope you find them helpful! If you would like any support in crafting a brand identity, please do not hesitate to get in touch!
