In this article we look at what Brand Strategy is and why it is important for a company’s growth.
Most people associate the word brand with the concept of big brand and thus companies with mind-boggling turnovers and huge global customer base.
Without a doubt, many large companies have invested in branding and this has made them recognizable to their audience.
We need only see a logo, hear a jingle or read a claim to turn our thoughts to the brand.
However, there is a big mistake in this association, and that is what the article you are about to read is about.
My favorite microbrewery
One of my favorite microbreweries sells its beers in glass bottles with simple graphics and consistent naming that are extremely tied to the area.
The main shop is in a small mountain village in the heart of Umbria. I tasted one of their IPAs there for the first time.
The consistency of branding means that now, even when I uncork a bottle at home, I remember the first experience, the mountain air, the warmth, and the cold beer.
If I feel like buying good craft beer online, I go to their site.
For me-and for other consumers who have enjoyed the product and experience-this is a brand.
Branding is not the preserve of companies with million-dollar budgets.
On the contrary, small and medium-sized businesses and professionals should also carefully curate brand positioning strategies.
And while the many businesses that pay attention to these aspects with consistent strategies that fit their goals achieve good results-as in the case of the microbrewery-there are also striking success stories. More on these later.
Brand strategy: what is a brand
Brand does not mean brand and does not mean logo. The concept of brand is closer to the concept of identity. The brand is the universe that revolves around the brand.
It includes tangible and intangible elements, which also touch on the emotional and empathetic level of people’s relationship with the company(Brand Experience).
To make a brand you need a logo, a color palette, a way of speaking, values, a mission, a certain way of putting yourself in front of your niche audience(Brand Identity).
Basically you need a Brand Marketing Agency to develop the whole long-term project for you, to intercept your target audience (buyer personas) and grow your Company in the Market.
The concept of Brand Strategy is extremely multifaceted and includes several elements such as, Brand Awareness and Brand Activism.
What is Brand Activism?
DEFINITION Brand activism is the commitment and involvement demonstrated by a brand (Brand) toward one or more causes of environmental, social, economic, and political relevance through communication campaigns, grassroots initiatives, and ad hoc projects.
The topic related to Brand activism has also been analyzed by Kotler and Sarkar in their book “Brand Activism. From purpose to action,” 2018
The two experts define Brand activism as “the clear willingness on the part of the company to take responsibility in the social sphere and to participate in achieving the common good.”
What is a company’s Brand awareness?
DEFINITION: Brand awareness is nothing more than the notoriety of a brand among users, that is, how famous and recognizable it is.
When working on a strategy aimed at fostering awareness of a company among users, the highest goal is to be the first choice at the purchase stage. A potential customer goes to the supermarket and decides to buy that particular product of that particular brand, this is because the company in question was able to convey positive values and messages.
Brand awareness and Aaker’s pyramid
David Aaker, a famous U.S. economist, created a precise pyramid to define the process of brand awareness.
The starting point is that of a total absence of knowledge, Unaware brand, which then goes on to evolve toward an initial brand recognition (Brand recognition). This occurs through the delivery of the first advertising messages, through traditional and digital media.
From Brand recognition we move on to Brand recall, which is achieved by continuous stimuli in recognition, enabling consumers to automatically associate products or services with a particular company, no longer needing any external prompting.
The highest point of the pyramid is the top of mind, that precise moment when consumers automatically and immediately think of a particular brand as they approach the purchase of a good or service.
Actions to improve one’s brand awareness
Brand awareness does not improve on its own. All companies should
- Strategic and professional use of social networks;
- Working with SEO and content marketing;
- Create online contests in which to include relevance between prizes and contest object;
- Targeted advertisements;
- Use of multichannel communication that goes to meet the needs of its audience.
Brand Strategy: Why do branding?
To make your Company or Business, whether small or large, recognizable. Being recognizable in your target market, means gaining new customers and increasing sales, especially if you have an e-commerce.
If yours is a small Company, the trick is to identify a small portion of customers, technically to define a niche market. How to do this? Simple, by specializing in particular sectors, areas, products and services.
Branding strategies in the digital age case studies
If you are thinking of setting up a new wedding dress atelier, differentiate yourself from the competition.
Don’t offer all collections, specialize on a particular type of dress.
You may be the only Atelier in Italy that offers red wedding dresses, or pink. True, only a small percentage of women would like to wear red at their wedding.
Yet you would be the only Atelier in all of Italy that specializes on that very dress. You would become the icon of red wedding dresses.
A Brand works if:
- Is recognizable;
- enjoys a good reputation;
- is the reference point (focus point) of a community of users who share a passion for that brand.
More and more companies are investing in the emotional aspect of branding to create solid bonds with their users and customers. They are the Love Brands, beloved by their community. They become totems of a value or lifestyle system that people can identify with.
Effective Branding Strategy
Everyone has to do branding. Small family businesses, medium-sized businesses, big brands, professionals.
Branding means communicating how you differ from your competitors and what competitive advantages those who choose you get; but it also means spreading your corporate values and mission. For all companies, it is increasingly necessary to embrace values and espouse them consistently.
Even some people are brands. Chiara Ferragni is in fact a brand, as she is Salvatore Aranzulla, for example. She is also a brand outside the web: you only need to see a blond bob to think of Carrà and her overwhelming cheerfulness.
The most important thing to know, however, is that even your favorite restaurant, your doctor, your small business can become strong and recognized brands for their target (target audience).
How to do it? What guidelines to adopt?
- Differentiate yourself from competitors and target a well-defined group of people;
- Make your products or services have something unique compared to others;
- Explore this concept in all your offline and online communication channels, including your website and social;
- Create an effective logo and choose a color palette that makes you recognizable;
- Study a naming that will be remembered and a claim (a “motto”) that tells your uniqueness;
- Create a website with the right user experience and a thorough SEO strategy;
- Have a consistent identity across every communication tool, from social to packaging.
Some memorable brands
As I said, all it takes is a logo, a jingle, a color, a claim to call a brand to mind.
But this cognitive input is not enough: the strongest brands have a community of users around them. Let’s look at some examples of memorable brands.
Coca-Cola vs. Pepsi
The world is divided between Coca-Cola drinkers and Pepsi drinkers. If Pepsi has retained market space, it is precisely because it has finally targeted a different niche of people than its competitor.
Coca-Cola sells significantly more: it has been working for decades to position itself as a brand of sharing and merriment and actually invented the current Santa Claus figure.
A branding strategy that works well, despite the grievances of activists and minorities over some somewhat thorny issues.
We saw this during the controversy raised when Coca-Cola became a sponsor of Cop27 on climate.
Patagonia
Patagonia is something of a unicum in the global landscape, both as a business model and as an ability to target a super-defined niche of customers.
They are people who love adventure and environmental sustainability, purists of mountains and nature. The secret of Patagonia’s branding lies in the consistency between the messages conveyed and the actual choices made by management.
Recently founder Yvon Chouinard made headlines for selling the brand to an investment fund and an environmental nonprofit.
Dolce&Gabbana
Let’s go back to Italy and think of one of the many luxury fashion houses that have made the country’s history. Whoever thinks “Dolce&Gabbana” anywhere in the world thinks of Made in Italy, luxury, flair, youthful and cheerful elegance.
The brand’s latest initiatives starting with the “Carretto Siciliano” collection in 2013 are inducing a new association in consumers’ minds between the fashion house and Domenico Dolce’s native island.
Sicily has continued to be a leitmotif in the commercials and campaigns of D&G, which has clothed many other brands with its Trinacria-inspired design in ad hoc collaborations.
Memorable small brands
If I have so far brought examples of great companies, it has been because they are extremely helpful in framing the concept of branding.
But can smaller realities be brands? The answer is yes.
As I mentioned at the beginning, there are striking success stories to tell.
Tonki
A consistent example of branding by a small company is Tonki.
It now has more than 52,000 followers on Instagram, with a journey that began from a very specific idea:
giving people the opportunity to print and frame their favorite photos on a unique piece of recycled cardboard.
It is aimed at a young, eco-conscious audience that likes to hang their memories in their home or office in a sustainable way.
Cynical beautician
In 2009 Cristina Fogazzi was a beautician like many others. A rented room, an employee and a line of cosmetics designed only for her store.
Then the turning point, progressive, of making herself an online brand. The “cynical” beautician, because she tells her clients the truth about the fact that miracle creams do not exist.
Today she makes more than 60 million euros from her Veralab products and has a huge following on social media. It has a cohesive community around it that recognizes itself in the brand.
Treedom
Who doesn’t have a tree on Treedom? The company was born in Florence, Italy in 2022 and has a simple operation.
You can adopt a GPS-enabled tree, have it planted and track its growth in special reforestation programs around the world.
The user-friendly portal, the values of eco-sustainability, and the idea of doing good hold the Treedom community together.
By 2022, it has come to plant more than 3 million trees and collaborate with 75 thousand farmers across the planet.
Numerous large companies have embraced the Treedom project.
Today, a small company has become a solid reality and one of the most promising brands in the environmental field.
Brand Strategy: Why should people choose you?
One of the first aspects to evaluate in building effective brand positioning is certainly the response of your target audience.
Consumers need certainty and reassurance about your product. Therefore, position yourself as a specialized company so that you immediately highlight your value as a company.
Give evidence of your expertise through awards or certificates, this will increase the perception of your brand in the eyes of the consumer, recognizing you as an expert in the field.
Social proof in this case is also a very useful ally in that people are unconsciously attracted to what the masses do.
Offering testimonials or feedback could be a great way to reassure the potential client and eliminate any doubts about you.
What is the differentiating element?
The differentiating element is one of the most powerful levers that can fix a particular brand in people’s minds. It is precisely this aspect that will make you stand out from the competition.
Ask yourself questions such as, “Do I have a differentiator?”, “Do I offer something different or unique from the competition?”
A differentiator is something that is distinctive from what your competitors offer. This could be represented by the fact that your product is, for example, easier to use or solves a specific problem.
If you can find a powerful differentiator, you will need to leverage it to stand out over the competition. It is this element that will make the difference!
Think for example of the brand of shoes that breathe. You already know who I’m talking about right?
Certainly because with its USP, “Geox, the shoe that breathes,” it has succeeded in impeccably communicating its differentiating factor, imprinting itself in the minds of consumers as the brand of shoes that don’t make their feet sweat.
Brand Strategy: How do you communicate the aspects that set you apart?
Communication is the basis of any marketing strategy especially when we talk about Brand positioning. It must therefore be clear and highlight your strengths.
Therefore, create a USP (unique selling proposition), which is a sentence or message in which you concisely explain what you offer, the differentiator, and why they should choose you.
This message will be your hallmark and its purpose will be to fix itself in people’s minds along with your brand.
Let me give you an example, “M&Ms the milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, not in your hand.”
Well, this is a USP that has been very successful as it immediately communicates the brand and the differentiating element i.e., “that does not melt in your hand.”
In conclusion, doing Brand positioning is essential if you want to gain a relevant place in today’s market. The power of a brand and the way people imprint it in their minds will help you succeed, exponentially increasing sales.
Factory Communication can help you differentiate yourself in the market through targeted strategies, such as analyzing brand positioning of competitors and defining your branding and communication strategies.
Do you want to start turning your company into a brand?
It is important to take the first step: position yourself in the market and differentiate yourself from competitors. Contact us to find out the strategies of Factory Communication Brand Positioning Agency.