About brand and branding
Branding is a particularly important tool for any company whose strategic plan places stable development and expansion of influence on the world market in the first place. A brand combines a complex of concepts, such as a trademark, a brand name, a logo and a company name.
Branding is a process of creating a positive image of the company, promoting this image and anchoring it in the minds of buyers. The branding process consists of a complex of measures for promotion, establishment and development of mutually beneficial relationships with customers. Due to the consistency and commitment to a common style a positive attitude to the company is formed, the level of loyalty and trust to it is increased.
To demonstrate the results of a truly thoughtful and consistent branding it would be enough to name world business giants like Google, BMW, Pepsi and Microsoft. Consumers anywhere in the world can name the product features of these brands and even their corporate colors and brand elements, the competitive advantages of the products and the mission for which the brand was created.
Effective branding always means generating positive emotions and associations - the strategy won't work otherwise. An example of this is the Coca-Cola New Year's commercial. Consumers recognize the original glowing holiday truck from the first seconds of the video, and the branded melody from the first notes. Besides, lately the brand transforms the video format into reality - in many countries on the eve of the New Year they conduct advertising campaigns with the participation of the legendary truck, "delivering a holiday" and an unforgettable festive mood in the form of a favorite drink. Such promotions evoke only positive associations and desires, unite people and simply make consumers fall in love with the brand.
Branding goals and objectives
Branding goals
It does not matter at what stage a company decides to engage in branding. In the ideal scenario - at the stage of business conception, in reality - when the understanding of its extreme necessity came. The purpose of brand creation and development is always the same - the formation of a single, clear and positively accepted image of the brand by users in order to increase business recognition and customers' loyalty to it.
The very concept of "brand" is of Latin origin, and in the dead language it means "mark". Since ancient times craftsmen all over the world, wishing to denote the belonging of goods to their hand or manufacture, have put a certain mark - a brand on the goods. This is the first type of trademark, which appeared and was used as a marketing tool.
When the scale of production outgrew the small family manufactures, there was a need for mass branding of goods. In a simple brand (trademark) it was read not just the name of the manufacturer, but of the whole culture, the characteristics of production and approach to service provision. Branding broadcasts to the masses the mission and values of the manufacturer, its attitude to customers. Branding should encourage consumers from the category of potential customers to become brand advocates, i.e. its most ardent followers.
Branding objectives:
- Creation of a positive image of the company and its products.
- Visual demonstration and argumentation of the value of products.
- Establishment of feedback and information exchange between the company and the target audience.
- Reflection of verbal and visual uniqueness of the brand or product.
- Consistency and confirmation of positioning in the market.
- Choice of marketing channels and development of promotion strategy.
- Highlighting competitive advantages.
- Formation of brand identity.
How the work is done
Market analysis and brainstorming
At the analytical stage we study the market and the target audience, define its segments and identify customer pains, evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of competitors. We use surveys and briefing, questionnaires and focus groups as tools for analysis. What really matters here is not the format of interaction with the target audience, but the competent analysis of the received information layer. From the total amount we extract only the most important: evaluations and associations, vision and perception of your product, the whole range of emotions that this product evokes and the real needs of customers, which your product can cover.
Who do we brief? Not just potential customers, but primarily your employees. We will prepare special questionnaires and surveys for each department of the company for each area we will work on: marketing, programming, copywriting, design, etc.
Why will there be so many briefs? Because each specialist has its own peculiarities of work and requirements for the initial information from the client. The more detailed and truthful the information from the source is, the more effective the result of our joint work will be.
During working meetings and meetings we will present our vision of the brand, its development and choice of emphasis on its strengths. Brainstorming by our and your company's experts will help generate discussions and constructive arguments in which the truth will be born.
Positioning and concept
After the previous step our team will have a valuable resource - detailed data about the target customers, their needs and the features of your product, which satisfy these needs.
Our next task is to highlight the strengths (advantages) of the company and its product and analyze the weaknesses (threats), which may negatively affect the process of promotion in the future.
Then we go to a strictly scheduled plan and algorithm for the development of positioning strategy - we create a brand concept and propose creative ways to implement it by:
- justifying the philosophy, values, and global goals of the brand;
- defining a list of associations that the product evokes in consumers and should evoke; we determine ways to achieve the result;
- coming up with a brand legend and its characters, clear and consonant with each segment of your target audience;
- developing a single brand symbol;
- providing a reasoned list of effective promotion channels.
Naming and branding
The process of branding is inextricably linked with another important process - naming, i.e. developing a brand name and creating its slogan. The obligatory requirement to both elements - they should be unique, capacious and understandable to explain the essence of the brand and its product. You should also think about the readability of the name of the brand in different languages - after all, it is possible that in the near future you will conquer foreign markets. The slogan and the name as the main elements of the brand and its corporate style are used in all advertising materials, both printed and electronic models, on the packaging, advertising posters, posters and announcements of partner events.
The result of naming - the finished unique name of the trademark is subject to obligatory registration in the state bodies of intellectual property rights protection. This will protect not only the results of our joint work, but also will protect you in the future from fakes and machinations of unscrupulous competitors.
Guideline and brand book
Developing a philosophy, a name, and brand elements is not the end of the job. The next step involves creating specific documents that tell you and all your employees and service providers how to properly use, distribute, and replicate brand elements:
- A brand book is a description of the semantic load of brand attributes and the philosophy of their creation. A brand book reflects the essence, mission, values of the company and how to translate them with the help of individual elements and visual style. The document systematizes all the constituent elements of brand ideology.
- A guideline is a document of more practical application. It is a guide to the use of brand attributes, which clearly demonstrates both acceptable and unacceptable uses of the logo and style. A guideline suggests how to organically design branded products (pens, folders, calendars, catalogs, letterheads, souvenirs and promotional products) so that they look aesthetically pleasing and work for the implementation of strategic marketing objectives.
Design and identity
At this stage a designer comes into the game, to whom a specialist marksman sends all the groundwork on branding and the semantic component of the brand. A designer thinks over the style and peculiarities of individual design of printed materials, packaging of goods, design of an internet resource and social pages of the company. A designer chooses brand colors and font pairs that best express the character and style of the brand.
Creating communication channels
We will help you create channels for information dissemination and ensure effective promotion of your brand in them:
- We create and develop pages, communities and groups in messengers, social networks, develop chatbots;
- We design and organize marketing campaigns and events online and offline;
- We help your site get promoted in search engines and take up positions in the top 10 of search engine results (SEO promotion);
- We start and control contextual advertising;
- We help optimize the site and increase its usability indicators;
- implement retargeting campaigns;
- We establish cooperation with popular bloggers in your niche and opinion leaders.
Evaluation of effectiveness
Evaluating the effectiveness involves analyzing the selected marketing channels, identifying communication blocks and problems in communicating with the audience, collecting and analyzing feedback (work with feedback). At this stage we also analyze a number of images that arise in the customer experience.
The benchmark for evaluating the productivity of a campaign is the metrics, the key indicators defined by the marketing strategy. One of these may be ROI - return on investment - as well as data from end-to-end analytics.
Further work with your brand
Our work on the development and promotion of your brand is not limited to the branding process. At the client's request we monitor the realization of the company's positioning, analyze productivity indicators, adjust communication and promotion channels, and provide recommendations on how to improve customer service.
In case the style is copied by competitors and the image load starts to accumulate negative associations of clients, it is necessary to rebrand - i.e. to update the image and image of the company.