How to Create Your Brand Strategy with Images
A brand strategy is a plan that defines how your business will present itself to your customers and stand out from your competitors. It includes everything from your mission, vision, values, personality, voice, identity, and customer experience. A strong brand strategy can help you build trust, loyalty, and awareness among your target audience.
But how do you create a brand strategy that reflects your unique style and resonates with your ideal customers? In this blog, I will share with you 8 steps to create a brand strategy with images, along with some great examples from successful brands.
Step 1: Know What You Stand For
The first step to create a brand strategy is to know what you stand for as a business. What is your purpose, philosophy, and passion? What are the problems you solve and the value you offer? What are your goals and aspirations? These questions will help you craft your brand mission and vision statements, which are the core of your brand strategy.
Your brand mission statement is a concise and compelling statement that summarizes why your business exists and what it does. It should answer the question: What is the impact you want to make in the world?
Your brand vision statement is a long-term and aspirational statement that describes what your business wants to achieve in the future. It should answer the question: How will the world be different because of your business?
For example, here is the brand mission and vision statement of Patagonia, a clothing company that is known for its environmental and social activism:
Our Mission: We’re in business to save our home planet.
Our Vision: A world where we reduce the environmental harm caused by our consumption and production, and where people use business as a force for good.
Step 2: Understand Your Audience
The second step to create a brand strategy is to understand your audience. Who are your ideal customers? What are their needs, wants, challenges, and aspirations? How do they perceive your business and your competitors? How do they make their buying decisions? These questions will help you create your buyer personas, which are fictional representations of your ideal customers based on data and research.
Your buyer personas should include demographic, psychographic, behavioral, and situational information, such as:
Age, gender, location, income, education, occupation, etc.
Values, beliefs, attitudes, motivations, preferences, etc.
Online and offline behaviors, habits, hobbies, interests, etc.
Problems, pain points, goals, desires, etc.
Buying journey, decision criteria, influencers, etc.
For example, here is a buyer persona for Airbnb, a platform that connects travelers with local hosts:
Name: Anna
Age: 28
Location: London, UK
Occupation: Marketing Manager
Income: £50,000 per year
Values: Adventure, freedom, authenticity, diversity, sustainability
Behaviors: Loves to travel, explore new cultures, and meet new people. Uses social media, blogs, and online reviews to find travel inspiration and information. Prefers to book accommodation online and pay with credit card or PayPal.
Problems: Wants to travel more often, but finds hotels too expensive, impersonal, and boring. Worries about safety, quality, and reliability of accommodation options. Wants to have a unique and memorable travel experience that reflects her values and personality.
Goals: To find affordable, comfortable, and authentic accommodation that matches her travel style and preferences. To connect with local hosts and communities and learn from their stories and insights. To have a positive impact on the environment and society through her travel choices.
Step 3: Find Your Sweet Spot
The third step to create a brand strategy is to find your sweet spot. This is the intersection of what your business does best, what your customers want most, and what your competitors do least. It is your unique value proposition, or the reason why customers should choose you over others.
Your unique value proposition should answer the question: What makes your business different and better than your competitors? It should highlight the benefits and outcomes that your customers can expect from your products or services, and how you deliver them in a way that no one else can.
For example, here is the unique value proposition of Spotify, a music streaming service that offers personalized and social listening experiences:
Spotify is a digital music service that gives you access to millions of songs. You can listen to music for free, or upgrade to Spotify Premium for ad-free, offline, and high-quality audio. With Spotify, you can discover new music, create your own playlists, and share them with your friends. You can also follow your favorite artists, podcasts, and influencers, and get personalized recommendations based on your taste and mood.
Step 4: Tell Your Story
The fourth step to create a brand strategy is to tell your story. This is the narrative that connects your brand with your audience on an emotional level. It should convey your brand personality, voice, and tone, and reflect your brand mission, vision, and values. It should also showcase your brand history, culture, and achievements, and highlight your brand promise, or the commitment you make to your customers.
Your brand story should answer the question: How do you want your customers to feel about your brand? It should inspire, educate, entertain, and persuade your customers to trust you, like you, and buy from you.
For example, here is the brand story of Warby Parker, an eyewear company that offers affordable, stylish, and socially conscious glasses:
Warby Parker was founded with a rebellious spirit and a lofty objective: to offer designer eyewear at a revolutionary price, while leading the way for socially conscious businesses. Every idea starts with a problem. Ours was simple: glasses are too expensive. We were students when one of us lost his glasses on a backpacking trip. The cost of replacing them was so high that he spent the first semester of grad school without them, squinting and complaining. (We don’t recommend this.) The rest of us had similar experiences, and we were amazed at how hard it was to find a pair of great frames that didn’t leave our wallets bare. Where were the options? It turns out there was a simple explanation. The eyewear industry is dominated by a single company that has been able to keep prices artificially high while reaping huge profits from consumers who have no other options. We started Warby Parker to create an alternative. By circumventing traditional channels, designing glasses in-house, and engaging with customers directly, we’re able to provide higher-quality, better-looking prescription eyewear at a fraction of the going price. We believe that buying glasses should be easy and fun. It should leave you happy and good-looking, with money in your pocket. We also believe that everyone has the right to see. Almost one billion people worldwide lack access to glasses, which means that 15% of the world’s population cannot effectively learn or work. To help address this problem, we partner with non-profits like Vision Spring to ensure that for every pair of glasses sold, a pair is distributed to someone in need. There’s nothing complicated about it. Good eyewear, good outcome.
Step 5: Design Your Identity
The fifth step to create a brand strategy is to design your identity. This is the visual representation of your brand, including your logo, fonts, colors, images, icons, and other graphic elements. It should be consistent, distinctive, and memorable, and reflect your brand personality, voice, and tone.
Your brand identity should answer the question: How do you want your customers to recognize your brand? It should create a strong and lasting impression on your customers, and communicate your brand message and values.
For example, here is the brand identity of Slack, a collaboration platform that helps teams work together more effectively:
Slack’s brand identity is based on four principles: simplicity, clarity, playfulness, and inclusivity. Our logo is a simple and clear symbol that represents our product and our mission. It consists of four colorful shapes that form a hashtag, which is a common way of organizing conversations online. Our fonts are clean and modern, and convey a sense of professionalism and reliability. We use two fonts: Circular for headlines and Lato for body text. Our colors are bright and vibrant, and express our playful and friendly attitude. We use a primary palette of purple, blue, green, and yellow, and a secondary palette of pink, red, orange, and teal. Our images are authentic and diverse, and showcase our inclusive and collaborative culture. We use photos of real people and teams using Slack in different contexts and environments.
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