Ultimate guide to building a successful Brand Strategy (in under 10 minutes)
Branding is a continuous and dynamic process that strives to make a product, service, company, or individual stand out positively in the marketplace. Creating a killer brand strategy does not have to be complicated or overwhelming. Here’s how.
LEARN MORE SEE HOW IT WORKS Creating a killer brand strategy does not have to be complicated or overwhelming. Here’s how. Branding is a continuous and dynamic process that strives to make a product, service, company, or individual stand out positively in the marketplace. The concept of branding is frequently used during product launches and marketing campaigns. But, if you are unsure how to create a brand strategy that’ll help you build a strong reputation, instant recognition in your market, and snappy association with a stellar customer experience, you are not alone. This post will share ways to build an effective brand strategy in the next 10 minutes or so.
So, What is a Brand Strategy?
A brand strategy refers to a distinctive long-term plan that companies of all sizes follow to establish a positive reputation in their marketplace. Whether you sell office supplies, internet tools, or physical products, this plan often addresses everything important, including your brand identity, market positioning, and messaging that will resonate with your target audience. A brand strategy outlines how you intend to do business in a way that inspires trust, is memorable, and builds customer loyalty. Branding is not marketing. While branding is what other people say, feel, and think about your business, marketing is what you say about it. Having a solid brand strategy can help you attract long-term customers, fuelling your growth and profitability without spending a lot on marketing. So, how do you create a killer brand strategy without getting overwhelmed?
Choose Who to Say No To
You are not going to appeal to anyone if you are out to cater to everyone. Some brands lose sight of their target audience by being "creative" or "unique". Making your campaigns memorable is an important part of the process. But striving to be ostentatious shouldn't come at the cost of alienating your customers. To begin, create buyer personas of the ideal customer(s) you'd like to have from the start. By following this approach, you'll be able to research your target audience, what they need, and what they're willing to pay in exchange for those products or services. Identifying your best customers' personas can also help you create messaging that emotionally connects with them and speaks to their needs.
Answer these seven questions (frankly) before you continue
Using the following brand strategy questions, you can come up with and develop each of your brand strategy elements:
• What do you do to solve which problem?
• How would you like your brand to appear visually?
• As soon as your brand's name is mentioned in your marketplace, what is the first thing you want people to think of?
• How do you want your customers to remember you after they purchase or use your product or service?
• How are you different from your three closest competitors?
• Where have your competitors failed your target customers, making you want to step in to help them?
• Where will you be in five years?
It's best to answer these questions as a cross-functional team to ensure you get profound answers and strategies to implement them.
• What do you do to solve which problem?
• How would you like your brand to appear visually?
• As soon as your brand's name is mentioned in your marketplace, what is the first thing you want people to think of?
• How do you want your customers to remember you after they purchase or use your product or service?
• How are you different from your three closest competitors?
• Where have your competitors failed your target customers, making you want to step in to help them?
• Where will you be in five years?
It's best to answer these questions as a cross-functional team to ensure you get profound answers and strategies to implement them.
Pick your Branding Type
You can use this step to develop your brand identity, positioning, and long-term marketing strategy. There are seven types of branding to draw inspiration from, each with a distinctive personality.
• Personal branding tells the world something about someone's character, personality, or work.
• Company or corporate branding conveys a company's identity as a whole, including its vision, mission, and company culture.
• Product branding showcases a product's unique characteristics, best use case, community/association, and other traits that boost recognition.
• Co-branding involves association with a brand, community, or solution to develop credibility.
• Online branding, or internet branding, helps position a business in an online market. A website, social media presence, blog, and other online content fall under this category.
• Service branding focuses on creating experience customers will remember and want to return to.
• Personal branding tells the world something about someone's character, personality, or work.
• Company or corporate branding conveys a company's identity as a whole, including its vision, mission, and company culture.
• Product branding showcases a product's unique characteristics, best use case, community/association, and other traits that boost recognition.
• Co-branding involves association with a brand, community, or solution to develop credibility.
• Online branding, or internet branding, helps position a business in an online market. A website, social media presence, blog, and other online content fall under this category.
• Service branding focuses on creating experience customers will remember and want to return to.
Put a face on it
You've developed a brand persona, know what your brand offers and why your customers will love it. Next, add a human touch to your branding efforts. For example, share real-world examples of how real people use your product. For your target audience to relate to your brand, these people should reflect the traits that your customer persona(s) exudes. Grammarly, one of the leading intelligent writing assistants, is an example of a company that does this well. Their videos showcase what kind of people Grammarly is ideal for and how they use it; for work, school, or chatting up friends. In this ad, Grammarly spotlights three different users at work and how the tool helps them get their jobs done.
Struck up a conversation (and keep it going)
With a face and personality for your brand, introducing yourself and establishing a rapport is the next step. You don't want to be shy or too self-absorbed. To connect with past, current, and future customers, provide value before asking them to take your relationship to the next level (by talking prices). By creating a content marketing strategy that is informative, engaging, and continuous, you can establish yourself as a credible and resourceful problem solver. But if you find it difficult to come up with fresh and grammatically correct copy, you can use AI content generators (some are free) and free online proofreading tools to correct your mistakes in no time.
Or, there’s a range of professional content marketing agencies you can work with. For instance, if you’re running a SaaS business, you can take advantage of SaaS content marketing services, that will create engaging content, and turn your visitors into potential buyers as well. Your social platforms should also serve as a place to continue the conversation with your target audience. With a powerful yet easy-to-use social media management tool RADAAR, you can automate everything social in one place, from scheduling posts and replying to mentions to posting at optimum engagement times.
What next?
Ultimately, be sure to say what you mean and mean what you say so you gain trust and referrals, which will help to strengthen your brand further. With just these five simple steps, you can create a brand strategy that makes sense for your business and target audience. You need not get bogged down in complexity.
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