Strategic Business Branding, part I

When the Harvard Business Review recently stated that few executives could say what their strategy is, it gave the impression that a tidal wave of businesses are potentially wasting a lot of time and money in marketing. I have witnessed this many times in my own experience where individuals within top level management teams each have a very different interpretation of the company’s strategy.

April 1, 2008, HBR Article Excerpt – “The thing is, companies with a clear, concise strategy statement–one that employees can easily internalize and use as a guiding light–often turn out to be industry stars.”

In addition to your employees, your partners, vendors, customers and network can all be advocates if they are empowered to properly and simply represent the company. In essence, your company’s strategy or brand is the key to making all your marketing efforts work much harder. The better you are at creating a brand promise that relevantly differentiates your company, the more likely you are to attract the right leads, and close a much higher percentage of them.

In addition to your employees, your partners, vendors, customers and network can all be advocates if they are empowered to properly and simply represent the company. In essence, your company’s strategy or brand is the key to making all your marketing efforts work much harder. The better you are at creating a brand promise that relevantly differentiates your company, the more likely you are to attract the right leads, and close a much higher percentage of them.

Creating Your Brand Promise

Most companies don’t see themselves in the business of marketing and thus spend little time trying to craft a brand strategy. If you are a company that tries to attract new clients or additional sales, then you are in the business of marketing. But don’t be confused by thinking that your elevator speech is your brand. A brand is a guide for every action and interaction that surrounds your company. This not only includes marketing, but product development, customer service, pricing, incentives, sales presentations, point-of-sale, events and much more. The brand embodies the total experience with your company that builds trust, expectations and perceptions over time. It is the consistent filter through which every decision from within the company should be judged. This is why so many companies waste their marketing dollars without a solid brand strategy in place. How do I create my company’s brand strategy and stop wasting time and money?

Below is a simple, four level outline of how to start thinking about creating and conveying your brand promise and entire brand story. It is a guide for what to say and when. This is important since we could all talk for an entire day about our businesses, but not all of that information is important for marketing.

Level One – The Brand Promise

This is the level of communications that is commonly missed entirely. As an example, think of how many websites you have gone to that provided no real understanding of how the company would solve or meet your needs. They simply talk all about themselves or focus on features and benefits of their product. All that is Level Two information that I may want to hear, but only if I know what the company or product is going to do for me first.

All websites, ads, elevator speeches, brochures, sales presentations, employee training programs, etc. should lead with the brand promise. The brand promise is what we all want to hear when on the other end of a sell. Make sure you know what your brand promise is and don’t be shy to use it.

If your brand promise follows the five principles listed below, it will be your most powerful marketing tool for converting leads into sales.

• Focus on customer and benefits it brings for them (don’t talk about you)
• Understand and acknowledge your prospect’s unmet need that you address
• Consider both rational and emotional connections to your brand
• Never promise more than you can deliver
• Create a singular statement that is easy to remember and re-articulate

Here are three examples of brand promises to help envision the end product:

• This is a brand promise for the Mazda Miata when it was first introduced into the United States: The Mazda Miata promises to bring the joy of driving within reach
• The Ritz Carlton is a great brand and a wonderful brand promise example: The Ritz Carlton promises to employ ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen
• To show how a small business can create a brand promise, I have included my own statement as a marketing consultancy for review: Magnetic Look promises to help solopreneurs develop successful and magnetic brand while saving their time and money.

Judge for yourself the ability of each brand promise above to stand up to the five guiding principals. Also think of the power of each of these brand promises if used properly, as a guide for employees, marketing, new product development and more.

Level Two – Reasons to Believe

Once you have caught your prospect’s interest and attention with the brand promise, then it is time to give them all the reasons to believe that you can deliver against that promise. If you lead with these reasons, it is very likely they will fall on deaf ears. Reasons to believe tend to fall into a number of categories:

• Credentials for the company or management
• Clients or projects
• Product or service features and benefits
• 3rd party endorsements/testimonials
• Unique point-of-views on relevant issues, topics or industry news
• 3rd party endorsements/testimonials

You can find the second part of this article HERE.