Just like an architect needs blueprints before they start building, you also need a proper strategy before building your brand strategy, or any of your marketing and advertising materials.

A good brand strategy will help set you apart from your competition, and that’s why I’m going to cover the 5 must-haves for a successful brand strategy.

What is a branding strategy?

Let’s say you were in charge of building your own house, what process would you follow to ensure that the structure was solid and able to withstand unforeseen circumstances?

I’m willing to guess that you probably wouldn’t start by mindlessly ordering all of the materials first, and then figuring out a way to put it all together. 

So why do so many business owners take this approach to their design and branding strategy? Well, one answer is that most business owners believe a common misconception that their brand is solely the way your logo, website, name, color palette, or typefaces look.

These all make up individual pieces of your brand’s experience, but if you take a closer look, you will find that there are a lot of layers hidden under the surface that make up the branding strategy, and it’s important for your business to outline a path to building a memorable, and favorable reputation with consumers in the marketplace. 

What follows is a breakdown of what I believe to be the 5 essential components of a branding strategy, and how when applied properly will keep you relevant for years to come.

5 essential components of a strong brand

Mission, Vision, and Values

Good brands have values, just like you and I do, and it’s important for your brand to consistently express them throughout every touchpoint you have with your customers.

When combined they create a belief system, and form the core theme of your brand. If you need a good place to start, then try to imagine what part your business plays within your industry.

What does your company do, and why does it do it? What kind of products and services do you offer? What’s your company’s purpose in society?

It’s then up to you to make sure that they are both stated, and demonstrated throughout the entire customer experience.

Research

Your brand lives in the interactions you have with consumers. So knowing as much as you can about them is vital to your branding strategy.

You should research your customer’s top questions about your industry, and address them with your content. You’ll also need to consider the size of the market you’re looking to enter.

This will help you understand how much business you’ll need to capture in order to be profitable. You’ll also need to consider what your market growth will be over the next 3, 5, or 10 years.

Researching your audience, and understanding their perspective will become critical when it comes to converting customers later.

Position

Competitive positioning is not a complicated concept. It’s simply about making a claim that your products and services are different, or better, and why you are a more valuable option to the customer.

When thinking about your positioning strategy consider these four key questions.

1. What is your market size? And who are your competitors?
2. Who are your customers with similar wants and needs?
3. What are your strengths and weaknesses? What unique opportunities do you offer?
4. How are you going to deliver value to the market?

Knowing what makes you different and setting yourself apart will help you influence, and win the attention of potential customers.

Messaging

When you talk about brand messaging, you’re simply talking about the written, and verbal content used during interactions you have with customers.

Do you have an elevator pitch that answers what you do in under 15 seconds?

Is the tone, and language consistent across all sales materials, including your website, presentations, and advertisements?

Even your sales team needs to follow consistent language when interacting with potential customers. If you were to ask your employees “what does your company do?” And would those answers be consistent?

More importantly, would that answer convince a potential customer to pick you over your competitor?

Visual Standards

This extensive document is known as a visual standard, or style guide is a complete instruction manual for your brand identity. It includes all of the strategy work, a breakdown of visuals, and how you should use them.

The entire goal of your visual standards is to ensure consistency throughout your promotional materials, and collateral. Most guides will cover your:

Logo Design, and specifications – including the do’s and dont’s of your logo

Color Palette – Both primary, secondary, and neutral colors

Typography – including font pairings, type hierarchy, and branded typefaces

Personality – distilled down to a few common traits

So what is a branding strategy?

The main takeaway is that your brand strategy will address a series of long-term, and strategic goals, that will ultimately allow consumers to recognize, and prefer your products or services over others.