Research

You want to paint a clear picture of the exact position your brand intends to occupy in the mind of your target audience. 

• Positioning: Understand your market
• Find a gap in the market
• ​Get to know your audience
• Create a buyer's persona
• Brand personality
• ​Mission statement
• Value proposition​ ​​
• The brand pyramid​​

Positioning: Understand your market

Finding out where your brand stands or where it doesn’t stand in the market, is a crucial first step. You need to research everything there is to know about your business and the market in which it will compete. ​

What problems do you solve? What makes you different?

Differentiate between knowledge and assumptions. Ideally you should conduct a fully realised diagnosis of your brand and interview decision makers.

Alternatively, work out where you are and where you could be in the future by making a list of these three things: ​

The facts. The obstacles. The opportunities.

​This simple exercise helps to identify key issues. Keep it focused, just one page. Look at all the possible ways your product or service solves problems for customers, both rationally and emotionally. Make sure the benefits you single out are genuine and tangible.

The aim is to find your USP, that one meaningful thing that makes your business stand out from your competitors. And you want to make that difference obvious and attractive.

Find a gap in the market

Look at what other businesses are doing.

A simple way to go about this is to do a competitor brand audit, a one page map, as illustrated here. The purpose of this is to assess a brand’s strengths and weaknesses against the strengths and weaknesses of its competitors, and to identify where there might be a gap in the market.

You should also have a look at other brands you aspire to. What are they doing that you admire?

Get to know your audience

The most important task in building a brand is to know who your customers are and how to reach them. What do they like and what do they dislike? You need to know their needs and motivators, as well as their overall profile.

​What makes them tick?

You know what problems your product or service solves, but to whom does it appeal? Define your target market by researching both existing and prospective customers. Use surveys, focus groups or Google Analytics to understand what your target market needs, why it is or isn’t buying from you, and what you can do to make your offering more appealing.

​Bring your customer to life by creating a persona for your ideal customer.

Try to describe a person you know. It could be a friend or a famous person. You’ll find it’s much easier to connect with your audience when you have a specific reader in mind. Here’s a few questions to get started:

• ​What’s the persona’s gender, age, income, marital status, occupation?
• What sort of problem does he or she have and can your product or service help solve this?
  
• What is the most relevant desire, need, hope or fear held by the persona that your business can address?
  
• What does a typical day in the persona’s life look like?
  
• Where does the persona get their information?
  
• What is important to the persona?
  
• What is his or her greatest hesitation in buying your products or services? List all pain points.
  
• How does she or he behave and talk?

Put yourself in their shoes every time you create content. If you are able to connect in a way that she or he believes, you will be able to create marketing campaigns that resonates.

Your brand personality ​

Consumers will most often decide if they like or dislike a brand based on the brand’s personality characteristics and the way the brand communicates. They are more likely to like and engage with a brand if they feel it is relatable to them in some way or another.

Assess the personality of your business as if it were a person. Just as you may define a certain friend as ‘witty’ or a colleague as ‘enthusiastic’.  What words would you use to describe your brand’s image?  What attributes and/or emotions do you want associated with your brand and what do you not want associated with your brand? It often helps to combine what a brand is with what it is not. (Professional but not dry and corporate. Casual, but not lazy and messy.)

One way of assessing this is by asking these questions: If the brand were to come alive as a person:

• ​What would it be like?   
• What would it do?   
• Where would it live?   
• What would it wear?

If you need some help to get going you might find Aaker’s “Big Five” personality traits useful. It’s a combination of varying traits that makes your brand unique.

Sincerity

Down to earth
Family oriented
Small town

Honest
Sincere
Real

Wholesome
Original

Cheerful
Sentimental
Friendly

Excitement

Daring
Trendy
Exciting

Spirited
Cool
Young

Imaginative
Unique

Up-to-date
Independent
Contemporary

Competence

Reliable
Hard working
Secure

Intelligent
Technical
Corporate

Successful
Leader
Confident

Sophistication

Upper class
Glamorous
Good looking

Charming
Feminine
Smooth

Ruggedness

Outdoorsy
Masculine
Western

Tough
Rugged

Mission statement and value proposition 

You want to paint a clear picture of the exact position your brand intends to occupy in the mind of your target audience. And you want to make sure it is saying something truly distinctive.​

​A mission statement lets the public know the product or service your business provides, how it does it, and who it does it for. A vision statement is a declaration of where your company wants to be in the future. It clearly articulates the hopes, dreams, and aspirations of a brand.

​Your values (often referred to as your company culture) let people know that you will act morally and ethically on your way to success.

Your brand purpose is your North Star. Sharing what you stand for will give your brand meaning and added value. However, you want to be 100% sure that your company really wants to do things differently. You have to stay true to the promise you make.

A value proposition is a simple summary of why a customer would choose your product or service.
​
It communicates the clearest benefit that customers receive by giving you their business. Every value proposition should speak to a customer’s challenge and make the case for your company as the problem-solver.

I quite like this simple formula by Steve Blank: We help (X) do (Y) by doing (Z).
​I help SMEs to resonate with their target audiences by designing visual communication.

The brand pyramid sums up this first chapter.
Start at the base and then move upwards.

Features and attributes
What do you do? How do you do it?

Functional / Emotional benefits
What problems does your product/service solve?
What positive emotions is felt by customers?

USP / Reasons to Believe
One meaningful reason that makes you stand out from your competitors.

Brand Persona
Describe your brand. What values are important?

​Brand essence
Capture the soul of your brand. The one big idea.

That's it for Chapter 1. I tried to use as little jargon as possible but I hope it wasn't too simplified? Would love your feedback on this in the comments below. No need to fill in website or email if you do not wish to do so... Thank you!

Go to Chapter 2: Strategy

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