7 Steps To Develop A Successful Brand Strategy

By Author: Manoj Upadhyay
Total Articles: 38
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The worldwide unemployment caused by the pandemic resulted in many people around the world turn to one of the things which had a positive impact – e-commerce. Several people who had lost their jobs or wanted to find another means of earning money in these unprecedented times, opened online stores.
 
Online shopping and live video shopping have certainly been making a lot of noise, not just on social media platforms, but via word-of-mouth too. While e-commerce is a super lucrative industry, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you will find success in it – it is increasingly competitive and majorly saturated, so if you plan on investing in it, make sure you have something good and different to offer.
 
One of the most important things required to be successful in such a competitive sector is branding. It’s no secret that consumers today, have become brand conscious and are favourable towards certain brands, which they feel they can identify with and that has more to offer than the ...
... others.
 
A brand is perhaps a professional firm’s most valuable asset. As a small business, you may be competing against big brands with devoted customers and unlimited marketing budgets. That’s why you have to find ways to stand out – with a solid brand building process of your own. Build a brand, not just a business.
 
When it comes to having a brand strategy, it’s not enough to simply have a few bullet points of what you want to do. Brands today need both a thorough understanding of why they choose certain strategies and a detailed outline of what their strategies will be.
 
This is because the more detailed you are in your branding strategy, the easier it will be for you to succeed when you execute those strategies. So, to make it easier for you, here are a few simple steps you need to keep in mind while developing your brand strategy.
 

Figure Out the Purpose Behind Your Brand

 
It’s never just about the money – every successful brand has a powerful purpose behind it, just like how you wake up everyday with a purpose, make that your brand’s mission too. There are 4 questions you need to ask yourself when defining a brand purpose:

Why does your brand exist?
What differentiates your brand from the others?
What problems does your brand solve?
Why should people care about your brand?

 
These ideas will help you form foundation of your branding – through a tagline, slogans, value propositions, voice, messaging, stories and more.
 

Differentiate and Position Your Brand

 
Before embarking on brand building, you have to take time to differentiate it so that you can attract attention and stand out from competitors. To differentiate your brand, you have to create a unique advantage in the mind of consumers not merely getting attention by brand building colours or logos or other superficial elements. One thing you can do to fulfil this step is check out the competition – find out what they’re up to, what are they doing that differentiates them from the others, do you research well. Once you come up with a unique value proposition, you should use a good branding strategy to position your brand in a way that will help consumers see and appreciate the greater value of your brand over competing ones in the market.
 

Determine Your Brand’s Target Audience

 
The foundation for building your brand is to determine the target audience that you’ll be focusing on. When brand building, keep in mind who exactly you are trying to reach. You’ll tailor your mission and message to meet their exact needs. The key is to get specific. Figure out detailed behaviours and lifestyle of your consumers. The more vividly this group of people is defined, the better you can understand them and ultimately connect with them.
 

Personalize Your Brand

 
If you want your brand building campaign or brand to be successful, then you have to personalize it. It is important to give your brand an identity. Let consumers see and experience the personality of your brand in its entirety. Look at your brand as something that a consumer wants to identify with pretty much as they would with their favourite cars, cell phones, or computers. The best technique to go about this is ask yourself whether you, as a consumer, would invest in your brand or not. As you engage in brand building, you should also invite customers to be co-creators of brand values so that they can feel that they also own it and relate with it. 
 

Outline Key Qualities and Benefits of Your Brand

 
There will always be brands with bigger budgets and more resources to command their industry. Your products, services and benefits belong solely to you. Starting a brand that is memorable means you dig deep to figure out what you offer, and no one else is offering. Focus on the qualities and benefits that make your company branding unique. If you have managed to figure out your target audience, it is now time to give them a reason to choose your brand over another.
 

Identify Your Tone of Voice

 
Much like the uniqueness of your personality, how you speak is also unique to you. Your voice is dependent on your company’s mission, audience, and industry. It’s how you communicate with your customers, and how they respond to you. When we hear a tone of voice that displays characteristics we’re more attracted to, we’re far more likely to listen to what they have to say. Once you’ve identified a personality which is most aligned to attracting your market audience, you must then enhance the believability of that personality with a tone of voice to match.
 

Craft Your Brand Story

 
Storytelling, in this context, holds more significance than you think. Stories have been known to capture the attention of people since the beginning of time. Why? Because we’re pre-programmed to listen to stories as it has been the primary source of knowledge transformation from one generation to the next for millions of years. Throughout these years our DNA has evolved to raise our attention levels when we hear a story. This instinct within us is more alive than ever before as our brains work overtime to filter out unnecessary information. A brand story is an opportunity to communicate on a human level, making a direct emotional connection with your consumers. Make your brand story simple and clear.
 
We hope these 7 steps will clarify some things and help you build a successful brand strategy. This may be stating the obvious, but virtual shopping has evolved over time and the emergence of live online shopping has been a major turning point, thereby revolutionizing the process of e-commerce like never before.