Brand Strategy and Trees – what do they have in common?

One of the key services we offer here at ideapro is Brand Strategy. In easy to understand terms, we’ll explain what it is, how it can help your business and why you should consider it before you design or refresh your logo.

Brand Strategy is often not well understood or even known about by some business owners or marketers, when considering to develop a logo for a business or product. The reality is, that well before you begin to work on any visual representation of your logo, there are many underpinning stages of work that should be done beforehand, to help achieve the best result.

We hope this analogy will help explain the process.

When you’re looking at a tree, what do you see?

The trunk, the branches, the leaves?

These attributes of the tree represent the visual expression of a brand.

What you see are the colours, aesthetic, logo and typography.

What you don’t see is the thriving root system upholding the tree. This is where brand strategy is represented.

What you don’t see are the:

• Internal brand
  • Vision, purpose, mission & values
• Brand positioning
  • Audience, competitors & difference
• Character
  • Personality & Brand Voice
• Verbal expression
  • Story Telling & Name/Tagline/Promise

Here each of these are briefly explained.

Internal brand

Vision –

What are your 5-10 year dreams and hopes? What are you trying to do. Your vision should capture your passion. This is usually for internal eyes only.

Purpose –

What is your why? Understanding the core reason of your business existing is one of the first steps in brand strategy. Why do you do what you do?

Mission –

What opportunities or needs exist that you are aiming to address and how will you do that?

Values –

What does your business believe in and stand for? This covers the contribution you make to your operations, to every individual that makes up your business, your clients and stakeholders.

Brand Positioning

Audience –

Who are your ideal target audiences? Aim to position your brand to potential prospects by fully understanding them as individuals and their pain points. You can achieve this through market research and creating customer personas.

Competitors –

You need to stand out amongst like-businesses. Undergo market research to identify the competitors in your niche or industry and really understand their positioning and product offering and how it compares to yours.

Difference –

Also known as point of difference, or USP (unique selling proposition or unique selling points). What can or do you offer your customers that your competitors don’t? Find out how you stand apart. Then use this in your marketing.

Character

Personality –

Identify the traits of your business. What are the human characteristics that make up your brand image? Make it relatable to your customers and what they want to experience.

Brand Voice –

Also known as tone of voice. The voice of your brand should be consistent across all forms of communication. What words you use and how you should use them. Ensure this aligns with your internal brand voice also.

Verbal expression

Storytelling –

Establish a narrative that shares your purpose and mission. This helps create a deeper connection between your business and customers. Stories that are memorable will help your brand stick in customers and prospects minds a lot longer than not having one.

Name / Tagline / Promise –

Your business and product name are exceptionally important. As is the tagline where you can tell your story within 2-5 words. Create a name accompanied by a tagline that embodies who you are and what you do. This will enhance your reputation and trust with a promise on what your product/service will achieve or deliver for your customers.

The Result

When the roots are strong, the tree grows well. Likewise, when brand strategy is strong (and actually undertaken), an impactful visual representation for your brand is achieved (the logo and aesthetics). This helps you position your business to be perceived in a way that’s most authentic to your vision, mission and purpose. Ultimately connecting to the right customers, with the right messaging in the way you envision.  

We appreciate this is a lot to digest. But don’t be overwhelmed. When it’s time to refresh or establish your own brand strategy, revisit this post and let it guide you slowly, working through each part step by step.

Or, if you’d like a helping hand, be sure to get in touch with us here. Brand strategy is what we love to do, to help businesses truly connect to their vision and to their ideal customers!

If this piece has helped you learn more about how to establish or improve your own brand strategy, we’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.