We make decisions every day. Some are easy to make, others harder to make. When it comes to running a business or organization, decisions are made for a variety of reasons, and based on a variety of factors. Sometimes decisions are based on financial factors, others on personal factors, and some just on a whim. Granted, there are many valid reasons from which to make a decision, but what if I said that when it comes to the long-term success of your organization, there’s only one factor to consider.

The most important question you can ask when making decisions about your business or organization is to ask yourself: How will this decision affect my brand?

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2008 was a very interesting year. 2009 is sure to be even more interesting. Given that we’re 12 days into a new year, I would hope that you’ve given some thought to what you want to achieve in 2009. I always love the turn of the year because it gives us a chance to look back, and then look forward – to wipe the slate clean and focus on what we can do better in the days, weeks, and months to come.
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What Is Branding?

There is a large difference between a brand and branding. A new logo, typeface, website, etc is not part of developing the initial brand idea – those are branding activities. You can’t do branding until you have a differentiated, relevant brand idea on which to base your branding activities.

Branding is how you go about establishing your brand’s differentiated meaning in people’s minds. Branding is about signals – the signals people use to determine what you stand for as a brand.

Have you established a differentiated meaning for the brand? What makes your brand unique? Is it a difference people care about? Do enough people care about the brand difference that the brand can turn a profit? Can the business strategy support the brand’s difference? These are all questions to ask before you think about developing any of your brand’s touchpoints because they involve the brand idea. Only after you have a strategic plan together based on these questions can you move on to creating brand signals such as a new website, social media platform, print campaign, or advertisement.

Branding is the creation of signals that convey what your brand stands for and establishes its difference in people’s minds. A brand is the idea. Branding is the transmission of the idea.

What Is Brand Identity?

“Products are created in the factory, brands are created in the mind” – Walter Landor

While brands speak to the mind and heart, brand identity is tangible and appeals to the senses. A logo is the point of entry to the brand. Brand Identity is the visual, verbal, and tactile expressions of the brand. You can see it, touch it, hold it, etc. On an average day, consumers are exposed to 6,000 ads and no less than 25,000 new products each year. It is now more important then ever to create strong, differentiated, and relevant brands.

Why Does It Work?

Brand awareness and recognition are facilitated by a visual identity that is easy to remember and immediately recognizable. Visual identity triggers perceptions and unlocks associations of the brand. Developing a consistent, solid brand identity is essential to create triggers – folders on a mental desktop – in your customer’s minds.

When is Brand Identity Needed?

From the moment we wake up to the time we go to sleep we experience 6,000 marketing messages. Every company needs to differentiate itself from its competitors and gain greater market share. Every company also needs to be distinctive. Examples where brand identity experts are needed:

• New Company / New Product
• Name Change
• Revitalize a Brand
• Revitalize a Brand Identity
• Create an Integrated / Consistent System
• When Companies Merge

Why Invest In Brand Identity?

The best identity programs embody and advance the company’s brand by supporting itself in every touchpoint of the brand and becomes intrinsic to a company’s culture – a constant reminder of its core values and its heritage. The mark is the pinnacle of a branding pyramid; recognition fuels comfort and loyalty and sets the stage for a sale. A stellar identity demonstrates rather than declares a unique point of view, from the interface of a website to the design of a product to the retail sales experience. It is important to invest in a brand identity because the only way to differentiate your products or services in a brand soaked marketplace is to create a unique, dynamic, and relevant brand identity and positioning iniatatives.

A Necessary Commitment.

A good identity does not guarantee success. An effective brand identity is tied inextricably to management’s desire to nurture it. A new brand identity program signifies the beginning of an investment of time and capital, not the end. Perhaps the most important characteristic of a sustainable identity is taking responsibility for actively managing the asset. A common mistake is assuming that once a company has a new brand identity, the hardest work has been accomplished. In reality the whole process is just beginning, and the hard work is ahead. At FiveSeven Studios, we are committed to a comprehensive brand development process, and we are looking for clients who are just as committed and motivated to growing their brands as we are.

Branding Imperatives.

• Acknowledge that we live in a branded world.
• Seize every opportunity to position your company in your customers minds
• Communicate a strong brand idea over and over again.
• Understand the customers. Build on their perceptions, preferences, dreams, values, and lifestyles
• Identify all touchpoints / Identity key touchpoints
• Use brand identity to create sensory magnets to attract and retain customers

What Is A Brand?

A Brand is a promise that links a product or a service to a consumer through a mental association that gets stirred up when the consumer interacts with various brand touchpoints. A brand is the perception of a product, service, experience or organization by the consumer, and can either be positive or negative.

Essentially, a brand exists in your mind. By way of analogy, think of the inside of your head as a computer desktop. When you know enough about a brand, you assign the brand a mental “file name” andput it on your desktop. The bigger the brand – i.e. the more you know about it – the bigger the mental file.

When the brand name comes up in conversation, or you have an experience with the brand, you mentally “click” on the brand file name. When it opens, the associations you link with the brand are set free. You feel something. You react in some way – positively or negatively – as a result of how these associations make you feel.

To become a permanent mental file filled with positive associations, a brand has to establish that it’s different in some way from the clutter of the rest of the desktop. A good brand establishes that it is worth “saving as” in your mind.

Brand Difference:

A good brand says something different. To make a brand worth “saving as” in the folder on your mental desktop, you have to come up with a different meaning for your brand relative to other brands in your category. And what is different is not necessarily the features, benefits or even the products or services of the brand. What has to be different is the promise to the consumer – it has to be different and unique from what other brands promise.

Brand Relevance:

But it’s not enough to have a different brand. Whatever it is that makes your brand’s idea different must also be relevant to people’s needs. There is no long-term value in a brand if it’s not something people will use or find important to their lives. You must create a brand relevance that people care about – and it must be relevant to your primary target audience. It’s not enough to just have a good idea – the idea must be something that your target audience can grasp, and positively respond to the brand promises.

Be careful not to water down your brand relevance towards your primary target audience, especially when considering new products, services, growth, new messages, etc.

NEGATIVE EXAMPLES

• Segway
• Clear Pepsi

POSITIVE EXAMPLES

• Apple
• Nike

How Do You Build a Brand?

Which one of the following examples do you think is the proper approach to building a brand?

Example 1

First, create awareness through the development of great advertising or a big promotion to let people know you’re out there. Once consumers are aware of you, you get them to consider using your brand and then convince them to actually  purchase it.

Example 2

First, establish a differentiated, relevant brand idea. Second, align this brand idea with your business strategy. Then create awareness through the development of 2-3 key Power Brand Signals supported with a variety of brand associations.

The proper approach is actually the 2nd example. While it is important to create awareness for your brand, this shouldn’t be the first priority in building your brand. In an information soaked world, the last thing your target audience needs is more information. If your first step is to simply create awareness with more information about who you are – without defining what makes you different, relevant, and therefore desirable above your competitors – it will be difficult to achieve success.

Instead, your initial focus should be to create a unique, differentiated brand idea that is relevant to your specific target audience. You should work to define your brand promises, and why consumers should choose your brand over your competitors. So many unsuccessful brands have focused on products first, brands second. In order to be successful, you must focus on the development of your brand first, then focus on how to bring your brand to consumers.

Capture the Essence of Your Brand:

Brands are successful not merely because they’ve established a relevant, differentiated meaning for their brands. Brands are successful because they’ve reduced this meaningful difference to a simple, clear, and cohesive thought. This clear and concise direction is what’s known as a Brand Driver. There can be several Brand Drivers that help to define the brand, but the bottom line is that you should be able to define the essence of your brand using these Brand Drivers in the time it takes you to ride the elevator from floors 12 – 18. As P.T. Barnum once said, you should be able to write it on the back of a business card.

The Goal:

Create a “desktop shortcut” on your mental desktop rather than having to sort through various folders and files.

Deliver On the Brand Idea.

The Goal: Align your business strategy with your differentiated, relevant brand idea.

In order for a brand to succeed, you must align your business strategy with your brand idea. Then develop a strategy to convey and deliver the brand idea – the brand strategy. Your brand can only be as good as your business strategy enables it to be. You must be able to deliver what your brand idea says you are going to deliver. At the end of the day a brand can only be as good as the experience of the brand.

The secret to the success of brands and branding is to find something different to say about your brand, make your brand idea as simple and focused as possible, and align it with a business strategy.

Questions to Ask:

1. What does your brand stand for in the minds of your customers?
2. What’s your business strategy?
3. Can you align (and how do you align) those two things?

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