What is a brand strategy and why do I need one?

Building a brand strategy is about creating the foundations for your business to ensure its strength and growth for the future. It’s not about creating a pretty logo and a brand book that sits in a drawer never to see the light of day.

In the same way as you’d think about a person, ‘you can’t judge a book by its cover’. Your logo and visual identity are simply there to signpost people to your communication. Your actual brand is the substance behind the imagery, that consumers use to understand your brand, build their perceptions and make purchasing decisions.

What values does your business stand for?

What does your business do?

What sets you apart from your competitors?

Audiences make their purchase decisions in many different ways and a brand strategy will give you the insights that you need to ensure that your audience are making a well-considered choice to buy your product or service. This is key to driving repeat business and advocacy.

Through simple advertising and PR you may naturally generate some top-line sales, just because you were there when the consumer had got to the stage when they were ready to make the purchase. This isn’t a sustainable business strategy and it’s unlikely to generate the results that you need for the long-term growth of your brand.

Now you know why you need a brand strategy, here’s some guidance on how to do it…

Brand strategy development should always be carried out by an external agency or representative – we would highly recommend the strategic team at Dupree International;-)

Your internal team are too close to the brand and will probably already have preconceived ideas. This is a process that needs to start with a blank sheet of paper, key stakeholders within your business and a team of expert investigators.

It’s imperative that all of the key decision makers within your business are part of the process from the start to ensure a smooth strategy development process and to enable a full understanding of the outcome.

Never start a brand strategy by considering your logo, photography style and fonts. You’ll end up wasting lots of time and money because the full strategy process will naturally drive these in a new direction.

The same with marketing planning – your new strategic direction and messaging will generate a fresh roadmap, which will allow you to prioritise target markets and sectors and focus your spend in the areas that will have the most impact.

The key to a successful brand strategy is for everyone to be open and honest.