What is brand strategy?

Brand strategy is a plan that encompasses specific, long-term goals that can be achieved with the evolution of a successful brand -- the combined components of your company's character that make it identifiable. 

A well-defined and executed brand strategy affects all aspects of a business and is directly connected to consumer needs, emotions, and competitive environments.

First, let's clear up the biggest misconception about brand strategy: Your brand is not your product, your logo, your website, or your name.

In fact, your brand is much more than that - it's the stuff that feels intangible. But it's that hard-to-pin-down feeling that separates powerhouse and mediocre brands from each other.

1. Why does your brand exist, really simple question

"Every brand makes a promise. But in a marketplace in which consumer confidence is low and budgetary vigilance is high, it’s not just making a promise that separates one brand from another, but having a defining purpose," explains Allen Adamson, chairman of the North America region of brand consulting and design firm Landor Associates.

While understanding what your business promises is important when defining your brand positioning, knowing why you wake up every day and go to work carries more weight. In other words, your purpose is more specific, in that it serves as a differentiator between you and your competitors. It’s the value you believe in, and the value you live by.

Find your purpose, and you’ll have a better vision of how your brand should grow. Frame your mission and vision, to have your answer in a better formed statement. 

As promised, we've included the 5 questions to define your brand’s purpose inside the ebook for you to set up an actionable plan for your business.

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2. Consistency is the key

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The key to consistency is to avoid talking about things that don’t relate to or enhance your brand. Added a new photo to your business' Facebook Page? What does it mean for your company? Does it align with your message, or was it just something funny that would, quite frankly, confuse your audience?

As you strive to build brand value and trust, assess how consistency works across all aspects of your identity, including messaging, tone, imagery and delivery. These elements are the basic building blocks of a consistent brand, and most brand managers should be familiar with how they impact your brand. 

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3. Reach beyond rationale, think about what emotion do you want your customer to feel

Customers aren't always rational.

How else do you explain the person who paid thousands of dollars more for a Harley rather than buying another cheaper, equally well-made bike? There was an emotional voice in there somewhere, whispering: “Buy a Harley.” But why?

A strong emotional connection is determined by the degree of overall positive feelings a customer has toward a brand and the extent to which a person associates the brand with key attributes. Some of the patterns or markers of such intimacy are fulfillment (when your brand delivers service that exceeds expectations), identity, nostalgia, indulgence, ritual and enhancement.

Find a way to connect with your customers on a deeper within our ebook in the chapter 3, in how to reach customer in emotional level.

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4. Durability & Flexibility

In this fast-changing world, marketers must remain flexible to stay relevant. On the plus side, this frees you to be creative with your campaigns.
You may be thinking, "Wait a minute, how am I supposed to remain consistent while also being flexible?"

Good question. While consistency aims to set the standard for your brand, flexibility enables you to make adjustments that build interest and distinguish your approach from that of your competition.

Take the opportunity to engage your followers in fresh, new ways. Are there some out-of-the-box partnerships your brand can make? Are there attributes about your product you never highlighted? Use those to connect with new customers and remind your old ones why they stay with your brand.
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5. Connect the people

in this era of digital, human connection worth more than just a representative, your employees are the reason why your company still runs today, and they are  touch when your customer give feedback. 

Community marketing is a brand growth strategy centered around bringing customers together over a topic that is aligned with, or directly related to, a brand in an engaging and non-intrusive way that puts customers first. TL;DR it’s about them, not you.

We’ve also included in 3 components of community marketing in the ebook we promised you. 

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6. Embrace the social loyalty

‘Social Loyalty’ has been gaining momentum over the past five years as an effective strategy to drive engagement, enablement and sales performance. Interestingly, many companies are still slow to embrace social media into their loyalty programs due to concerns that  they cannot control the conversation. However,  it is now apparent that participation,  as opposed to control, is the most effective way to drive participant behavior.

Be presence and interact closely with your audience. Include them in your process. Nothing sells more than making them part of your tribe.

7. Competitive awareness will help increase the category of your industry

of which then increase the market size, then followed by your market share as said in the previous article. Read here in how you can incrementally increase your market share if you haven’t already. 

Take the competition as a challenge to improve your own strategy and create greater value in your overall brand. You are in the same business and going after the same customers, right? So watch what they do.

Do some of their tactics succeed? Do some fail? Tailor your brand positioning based on their experience to better your company.

Conclusion:

These are the 7 pillars of brand strategy that we always implement to our client’s strategy as a base foundation. Of course we then tailor their needs in a way their brand is positioned, and taking all other factors that make sure we inclusively consider should that be a stakeholder, owner, c-suite managements and even customer advocates. 

Transforming business digitally is hard, let alone synchronously implementing your brand experience throughout all your customer's reach.

We got you. 

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As mentioned, we’ve put together all the nitty gritty information that your business need all in one free ebook. Download it before this campaign is expired. 

Grab one of these slot to really just have a conversation with our expert. No sales, no pitch, just a conversation.

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