We now know that every business who aims to grow and establish themselves in the market should be defining their brand strategy and brand identity. The brand strategy is what your brand stands for and is a promise that the business makes to their customers and sets them apart from the competitors in the market.
Before we get started on the break down, it is important to note that while coming up with your business plan and idea, it is good to think beyond profit and what is important to you. Creating a brand strategy is only as good as how deep and genuine the heart of your brand goes. It is easy to fabricate a story for any business but if they don't truly believe in it and live up to it in every aspect then they have failed in terms of authenticity and this will not resonate with consumers.
Sure, you might be thinking, a promise is easy to make but let’s break down exactly what it is that goes into a brand strategy.
There are 4 main parts of a brand strategy:
The first 3 parts are internally focused and are aspects that everyone working in your business and creating assets for your brand should know and internalise. These will show outwardly through the business processes, brand identity and marketing.
Target Audience
The first part of crafting the brand strategy is defining who your target audience is. This goes beyond the demographics and will look into consumer behaviour, psychographics as well as motivation. These should get as specific as possible so that we can really get into the lives and minds of these target consumers. Once we have this information,we put together target audience personas. Having these personas gives us a clear idea on how to craft the brand so that they resonate with it. Any decisions that your brand makes in the future will come back to these target audience personas.
Value Proposition
The second part of crafting our brand strategy is creating the value proposition. This is a statement that promises what the business will provide in terms of product or service to the marketplace. It should answer what people are buying from your business, what need do you fill in the market and what’s the advantage or unique about what you’re offering that sets you apart from similar offerings in the market. It should very clearly state what value you’re providing to your consumers.
Positioning
The positioning is often conveyed through a statement or statements depending on how many target audience personas you have. While there are some similarities with the Value Proposition, it is different in the way that it is focused toward a specific segment or persona. In the positioning statements, we define how the product or brand sets itself apart from the competition, explain specific benefits of the product / service and how the benefits will be communicated to prospective customers. The statements will definitely have similarities but the focus and specific should be adjusted according to what is important to the particular persona. These statements help you keep in mind your customers’ view of your business.
The last part of the brand strategy should also be translated to the brand identity but is also more outward facing, meaning that you should communicate these directly to your consumers.
Brand Messaging
Within this part of the brand strategy are several sub parts that all come together to form one big picture of the heart of your brand.
Brand Story - This story outlines why you created your brand and how it was born. It highlights anything meaningful and also gives customers an understanding of the person behind the business.
Mission Statement - This statement acts as a compass for employees and also shows customers what the brand sets out to do. It should include the purpose of your business, who it’s for and why your business does things in a certain way.
Vision - Having a vision statement is important for any business that wants to grow. This conveys where the brand wants to head and aspires to be. Creating a vision statement can help a brand stay on track and transparent with its customers.
Values - These are important in showing what your brand believes in and stands for. However they shouldn’t just be there for show, your brand needs to prove these in the way they do things. These values are a moral compass and should guide decision making for every person in the business
Brand Pillars - Pillars are what the brand is built upon and are the strengths and key aspects of a brand. These are shown through supporting messaging points, specific ways that your brand demonstrates these strengths.
Personality - Every brand should have a personality, this can start with a brand archetype and evolve into the brand attributes. You can think of this part as breathing life into your brand. The personality forms a big part of the brand identity and what it will look like.
Brand Attributes - These attributes are a subset of the personality. If you think about your brand like a human being, these are how your brand would think, act and look like.
Brand Voice - Having a clear and consistent brand voice is important, if you think about the way we talk or someone close to you talks, it is usually quite characteristic of them, the words they use, the tone and even the things they talk about. The voice is an essential part of keeping consistency and conveying personality throughout your touchpoints.
To summarise, the 4 parts that make up a brand strategy are:
Target Audience Personas
Value Proposition
Positioning
Brand Messaging
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