Suffering with the branding blues? Do colleagues talk blandly about your brand? Do your communications fall on deaf ears? Have you outgrown your brand?
Do you even have a brand?
If ‘YES’ comes to mind, then now is the time to bravely brand where no man has branded before!
Let’s start with a definition:
Put simply, your ‘brand’ is what your audience think when they see or hear your brand name.
What they think is the result of:
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How you directly or indirectly interact with them
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What they say about you to others, and
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What others say to them.
Their perception of your brand will also be influenced by brand noise, such as competing brands and social change.
To stay ahead, brands must adapt with consumer’s ever changing expectations. People fast become bored seeing the same old comms time and time again, hearing the same old message.
Use your brand to differentiate as a competitive strategy and stand for who you are.
In a branding paradise, your audience’s perception would align with your mission, vision, and values. Harmoniously interacting for mutual benefit.
Now it’s time to decide, how can your brand be brave?
Here’s an exercise to get the ball rolling:
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Assess your current brand
Is it time to step outside your comfort zone and make a change for the better? Initial indicators could be asking your staff and key clients for their opinion via a short survey, and benchmarking against competitors.
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Next, create a mood board
Inspire ideas around how your future brand could look and feel. Start with buzz words, what tone might it take? Is your current brand name still appropriate, would an evolution benefit? How could your message be effectively communicated to engage and trigger a positive reaction? What images and colours appeal, what would they signify?
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And finally, how can your brand stand out against competitors?
Identify your top 10 competitors, gather images of their logo, key web pages, advertising, social media, brand assets such as presentation templates or supporting graphics. Do the same for your brand and consider how well you stand out among the sea of alternatives being presented to your audience. Use this to develop ideas for your new brave brand.
Below you will find a couple of client links to demonstrate brave brands in action:
henrynicholas.co.uk – a recruitment agency that ‘makes you feel at home’
agilekrc.com – taking off in the project management arena