The methodology of crafting brand strategies, defines ten steps on the “yellow brick road” to an irresistible brand, each complete with its own tools, and all composing a comprehensive and well structured work process. Using the ten not so easy, but sure-fire steps, you can create truly amazing brands.
Category: Branding
Online-only brands ‘lack trust’
A survey of over 1,000 customers by insurers Direct Line shows even though internet buying is surging in popularity, shoppers still do not trust online-only brands.
Despite the convenience of shopping online, nearly two out of three consumers prefer to buy a known and trusted brand that also exists offline,
the study claims. Only one in three feel as well-informed when purchasing goods online as they do when buying face-to-face or over the phone, while 83 per cent prefer access to an expert, a feature not inherent in web-based companies.
“Consumers today want the convenience of the internet and the comfort of knowing an expert is at the other end of the phone at any time,” said Emma Holyer, from Direct Line.
The survey found the attitude pervasive across all age groups, particularly among 25- to 34-year-olds, an audience typically more relaxed to brand affiliation.
Some 65 per cent of this group said they believe brand awareness to be a key factor when purchasing online.
Well I wouldn’t totally agree with this study, looking at brands like Amazon or eBay, but we also have to consider it took some years for these kind of brands to become what they are nowadays.
Five Dimensions in Branding
In contemporary branding we have the option to not just ‘brand’ products, services or organizations, in order to make them more appealing to consumers. Brands are now often conceived as well-differentiated concepts of novel and exclusive ways to provide a benefit (of any sorts) to consumers.
Brand Actualization is performed in five interlinked dimensions (although there is no necessity to use all five), all serving our dual purpose of both arousing anticipation of benefit and fulfilling them:
Corporate identity basics
Corporate identity refers to the strategic concept for positioning a company. It entails defining identity traits, integrating them into a congruent action concept and coordinating them within this concept. Its objective is to permanently anchor a distinct, easily recognizable image in consumers’ minds.
Brand System – The Experience
As mentioned before, experience is the third step in defining Brand as a System. Brand experience is the aggregate of consumer perceptions that come from interacting with a brand.
The process of exposing consumers to the various attributes associated with a particular brand, a successful brand experience creates an environment in which the consumer will be surrounded by the positive elements attached to the brand.
Sucessfull Online Branding
Web presence is nowadays essential part of the branding process. That’s because the Web is equally a:
- Communication medium that conveys image. To take advantage of the inherent strengths of the Web — potentially endless depth and two-way communication — sites must provide content and function that support Brand Image. For example, to back up Apple’s claim to “lead the industry in innovation,” its site must describe the innovative aspects of Apple products and provide standout function like a best-in-class configurator. To reinforce multichannel marketing campaigns, sites also need elements like language, imagery, typography, and layout to be consistent with both the intent of the positioning and the style of ads in other media.
- Delivery channel that enables action. Sites don’t just appear before customers the way television ads do. If a customer sees a home page, it’s because she typed a URL or clicked a link — and that means she arrived with goals like finding specific information, making a purchase or getting service. To avoid frustrating and annoying her — a bad way to build brand — sites must supply the content and function she needs to achieve her goals. For example, customers looking for a low-cost American Express card need content that includes annual fees and APR plus function that lets them apply online. Sites also need navigation that makes it easy to find the content, and they need presentation that makes it easy to consume the content.
Brand System – The Identity
As mentioned before, brand identity provides the information consumers use to make determinations about whether to purchase your products or services and what they should expect from the experience. It’s the calculated way you characterize, package, and position your offering.
AllAboutBranding.com defines brand identity as a unique set of associations that the brand strategist aspires to create or maintain. These associations represent what the brand should stand for and imply a potential promise to customers. It is important to note that a brand identity refers to the strategic goal for a brand; while brand image is what currently resides in the minds of consumers.
Brand System – The Offer
The first step, in building a brand as a system, is at once the most important and sometimes the most difficult. The business has a product or service to offer, in many cases more than one of each. Each product or service must be carefully studied to determine what is special about it. Once the firm has done this, it must deal with the underlying question of why people should buy from this business rather than some other. What does this firm do that is singular or unique, that sets it apart from all other firms? What constellation of skills and resources does it have that gives it the potential to do other things as well?
Beyond Brands – Lovemarks
Lovemark is a new term coined by advertising agency Saatchi and Saatchi, defined as the next step beyond branding. A key idea is that lovemarks inspire “Loyalty Beyond Reason“.
What differentiates the brands that struggle from those that perform well is that the latter are lovemarks, explained Micky Denehy, marketing director for Europe, the Middle East & North Africa, of Saatchi & Saatchi London. According to him, lovemarks transcend brands as they deliver your expectations of great performance. Unlike simple brands, they manage to create an intimate, emotional connection with the consumer.
“Take a brand away and people will find a replacement. Take a lovemark away and people will protest its absence,” he said.
Make Your Small Business A Big Name
Brand building is simply a new label for a collection of functions that have always been necessary to make a business successful, requiring ongoing effort in several areas to increase the public’s awareness of your business name and logo as well as to build a strong company “essence” that inspires loyalty and trust in your current customers and provides a level of familiarity and comfort to draw in potential customers.
A carefully built brand is worth more in actual dollars than all the tangible assets put together and is what will reap monetary rewards when you’re ready to sell your company. The first thing you have to do is decide how you want people to perceive your business, and then figure out what you have to do to get there.