BRANDING, BRAND DEVELOPMENT & MARKETING
Having a consistent brand message will differentiate, elevate and separate you from your competition.
“Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room”
– Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon
“An effective brand strategy gives you a major edge in increasingly competitive markets. But what exactly does “branding” mean? Simply put, your brand is your promise to your customer. It tells them what they can expect from your products and services, and it differentiates your offering from that of your competitors. Your brand is derived from who you are, who you want to be and who people perceive you to be.” – entrepreneur.com
Legitimacy – Brand positioning must be built around a promise which you can legitimately deliver.
Distinctiveness – The purpose of a Brand is not to describe, but to distinguish or differentiate your business in the market place.
Relevancy – Your message and promised value must be relevant to your audience: customers, potential customers, employees and the community.
Consistency – Your actions and communications must be consistent with the Brand message. It is critical that you deliver on your strengths through all the things you do, from training employees, to the way you deliver services and products to customers.
It’s important to spend time investing in researching, defining, and building your company’s brand. After all, your brand is the source of a promise to your consumer.
Here’s how Graphic Structure can help you with your branding:
Visual / Corporate Identity
What does the look of your brand say about your organization?
Your visual / corporate identity is an expression of your brand. It lives in your communications, and in the minds of your customers. A powerful visual expression can influence the perceptions and actions of your employees, partners and customers—often much more than they realize or can rationalize.
A good visual identity is more than just a pretty face. Our approach is analytical and creative, leading to a visual identity that truly brings your brand to life. A logo, colour palette, typography, and imagery style are all threads of the visual system, but it’s your underlying brand strategy that weaves them together as one cohesive expression. Once all the elements are in place, we construct guidelines that will inform and inspire your internal and external creative teams as they implement your identity across each and every touchpoint.
Brand Playbook
A Brand Playbook is a guide to your business and what makes it unique – who you are, what you do and how you get it done. It should be used internally by all management and employees, as a check list for guiding all business practices. Use it externally for focused and consistent messaging. Use if for business development and targeting specific personas or markets with future tactics.
Graphic Structure can work with you on developing a Brand Playbook that will help your company or organization maintain a consistent and effective brand presence.
“Your premium brand had better be delivering something special, or it’s not going to get the business.”
– Warren Buffett
A brand’s mission should drive all of your marketing efforts.
Strategic Brand Platform
What does your organization stand for? How is it different? And why should anyone care?
A strategic brand platform is a simple framework that helps you answer these fundamental questions about your brand—guiding your organization’s thinking, communications and behaviour.
We discover the core insight of your brand—we don’t manufacture it—and build your strategic platform upon it, consisting of a purpose, promise, values and voice. Purpose is the difference you seek to make in the world: it’s why you do what you do. Promise is your pledge to customers: it’s what you do for them and why they should care. Values humanize your organization and guide your behaviour. Your Voice defines the tone and style that evokes your true character in all forms of communication.
A strategic brand platform will give you’re organization the foundation it needs, to express your brand in everything you do and say.
Brand Platform Key Components
- Overview of Market Space /Competitive Landscape
- Competitive Advantages
- Core Brand Values
- Brand Position Statement
- Brand Vision
- Brand Attributes/Personality
- Brand Essence
- Brand Character/Tone of Voice