The Quest for a Great Brand- How to Position Your Brand, Part One

THE QUEST FOR A GREAT BRAND

HOW TO POSITION

YOUR BRAND PA R T O N E

CONTENTS 3 4 8

THE JOURNEY IN THREE PARTS BRAND, A BRIEF LOOK AT ITS ROOTS ——Culture of Desire ——Twentieth Century Changes ——A Reason for Being

THE BRANDING MOUNTAIN ——How to Get to the Top

CONTACT POINTS 10 —CUSTOMER —The Total Brand Experience ——The Brand Wheel

PEAK BRAND POSITION 12 —REACH —Setting the Strategy ——Seven Core Features

YOUR BRAND SHINE 18 —MAKE —Next: How To Get a Unique Brand Personality

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

THE JOURNEY IN THREE PARTS To reach the pinnacle of effective branding, we’re presenting a three-part series in which we investigate the components of a successful brand.

Part 1: Brand Position How a service or product fit into customer minds relative to competitors Part 2: Brand Personality Defining a company’s personality, attributes and values, and how they affect brand messaging Part 3: Brand Identity The style, logo, typography and images that best represent the brand In this first ebook, we will focus on brand positioning, the first step in developing a unique brand story. Let’s get started with the meaning of “branding.”

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

BRAND, A BRIEF LOOK AT ITS ROOTS With the constantly shifting landscape in the age of multiple platforms, it’s more important than ever to understand the role brand has in the success or failure of your company.

Brand: where did it originate?

2,000 B.C.E.

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To best illustrate today’s meaning of it, let’s go back to 2,000 B.C.E. The term branding comes from Old Norse “brandr” which means to burn. Live stock, slaves, timber and crockery were “branded” with markings or symbols of their owner. These marks depicted ownership, in particular, items which had value. It was in the 1800s when the transition was made from “this belongs to me” to “this was made by me, so buy it” that products and services began to use branding to set them apart from their competition.

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

CULTURE OF DESIRE 1860

Jump ahead to late 19th and early 20th centuries. The birth of the mail order catalogue and the expansion of the railroad and postal service caused a massive shift. Society moved from a culture of need to a culture of desire. Customers were able to buy products and services previously unavailable to them.

TWENTIETH CENTURY CHANGES 1940

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After WWI, factories turned into manufacturing facilities to make products, which vastly increased competition. Companies saw a need to differentiate themselves and their products, so the “unique selling proposition” or USP, developed by adman Rosser Reevers of the Ted Bates agency, was born. He said “each advertisement needs to make a proposition to the buyer.” In essence, the ad must tell the buyer what the specific benefit the product has that other similar products do not have. That’s the point-of-difference, one of the essentials in a brand story.

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

With the advent of the internet and smartphone technologies, a similar shift in buyers’ attitudes is occurring today.

A REASON FOR BEING 2016

More than ever, 21st century buyers are inundated with advertisements and promises, backed by endless titles, names and brands. Despite the original term’s roots as a visual mark of cattle ownership, a brand is not just the logo.

Increasingly, branding is about reaching out to the world with a consistent value system, a way of doing business that makes the company stand out among its competitors.

Good branding means good business.

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

GOOD BRANDING ANSWERS THE QUESTION: WHAT IS YOUR MARKET POSITION?

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

THE BRANDING MOUNTAIN:

WHERE ARE YOU? HOW TO GET TO THE TOP

Are sales falling behind? Are clients complaining about the company’s service? Is employee morale flagging? The company’s brand may be stuck at basecamp.

Most companies are unfortunately floundering near the bottom, at the most basic stage of the brand story. They may have what they think is a solid brand without knowing how to best utilize it or market it effectively.

The challenge is to move beyond shallow graphics or metaphors to achieve the more effective aspects of branding. We must reach the internal culture and core of the company and be able to communicate the brand through actions.

Where do these actions occur?

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

The Peak: A Fully Integrated Brand Company policy supports the internal and external brand position.

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Unique Personality Companies live their culture and values.

Well-Positioned Businesses know how to stand out in the marketplace.

Recognition Businesses know what they stand for. They have “purpose� but no positioning.

Most Companies Are Here

Not Branded No consistency or value system. No brand recognition.

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

CUSTOMER CONTACT POINTS THE TOTAL BRAND EXPERIENCE How does a company’s total brand experience actually influence buyers? How does the brand reach maximum effectiveness?

The Brand Wheel illustrates this quite simply. At its core is the brand’s position: what value do you bring to your customers, what is the business’ culture, how does your business operations and financial health affect the company’s ability to fulfill its brand position?

Your brand is the cumulative experience your customers have with your company at any combination of these touchpoints.

Ideally, the experience should be consistent across all marketing initiatives and at all times.

“Successful companies don’t just have a brand identity, they create a total brand experience. A total brand experience causes people to FEEL their brand.” ­­ —Amy Rees Andersons, Forbes

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

THE BRAND WHEEL:

POSITIONING INFLUENCES MARKETING ACTIONS

MARKETING COLLATERAL

DIRECT MAIL

PUBLIC RELATIONS BUZZ MARKETING

WEBSITE FINANCIAL & OPERATIONAL STRENGTH

SOCIAL MEDIA ONLINE VIDEO

MARKET POSITION

TRADE SHOWS COMPANY CULTURE

YOUR BRAND

EMAIL MARKETING

ONLINE ADVERTISING

PRICING

VALUE PROPOSITION

PRODUCT OFFERING GRAPHIC STANDARDS

PRINT & BROADCAST ADVERTISING

CUSTOMER SERVICE

DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS SALES CHANNELS

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SPECIAL EVENTS

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

EXPERIENCE USING YOUR PRODUCT OR SERVICE

HOW TO REACH PEAK BRAND POSITIONING A comprehensive Brand Profile is segmented into 11 distinct categories. We’ll start with the seven core features that will establish your brand strategy.

• What is the company’s mission and vision?

• What value do you bring to your customer?

• How are you different from your competitors?

• Who is your audience?

• Who are your shareholders, customers, staff and the local community players?

• What are your offerings?

• Who are your competitors?

Answers to these questions will define your brand position.

Their importance in the structure of the company will guide you to maximize brand positioning benefits.

“When management takes an intelligent, forward-looking approach, it will positively influence its brand positioning in the eyes of its target customers.” ­­ —cultbranding.com

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

THE BRAND STORY PART 1:

POSITIONING STRATEGY Mission and Vision

Brand Messaging

Value Proposition

Points-ofDifference

Values

Personality

YOUR BRAND

Core Attributes

Key Stakeholders

Key Competitors

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Target Market

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

Key Products or Services

MISSION AND VISION As the soul of your company, determining your company’s purpose, vision and mission will help define the brand promise, engage employees and foster customer loyalty.

“Companies with highly engaged workforces outperform their peers by 147% in earnings per share.” ­­ —Gallup

VALUE PROPOSITION Identify why customers would buy your product or service to pinpoint the benefits your company provides.

“Developing strong value propositions not only makes it easier to connect with target audiences, but it establishes a foundation upon which a company’s marketing and sales activities can be built upon.”

—Mark Evans, Forbes

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

POINTS-OF-DIFFERENCE Characteristics or competitive advantages that differentiate the company from its competitors will create superiority for your organization.

“You make the concepts tangible, and focus your resources to develop those differentiators into a sustainable competitive advantage for your brand.”

–Jeremy Miller, Sticky Branding

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TARGET MARKET Narrowing your target market and ideal customers to focus your marketing budget and brand message on a specific audience will have the most impact and greatest benefit.

“Companies that successfully engage their B2B customers realize 63% lower customer attrition, 55% higher share of sales, and 50% higher productivity.”

–Gallup

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

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KEY STAKEHOLDERS Making sure key groups of people such as employees, investors, business partners, and vendors, clearly communicate and understand your brand will give a unified and consistent representation of your business to customers.

“All employees are brand ambassadors, even the ones customers don’t see.”

– Susan Sorenson, Keri Garman, Marketing Director, Gallup

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KEY PRODUCTS OR SERVICES Identifying your offerings that are most recognized in the marketplace will help differentiate you from competitors.

“Strong products and services are highly differentiated from all other products and services. It’s that simple. It’s that difficult.”

–Austin McGhie, Brand Is a

Four Letter Word

The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

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KEY COMPETITORS Evaluate key competitors to isolate characteristics of each to help determine how to differentiate your company. Knowing your competition is critical to positioning your brand and messaging.

“Whether you’re creating a new business or revamping an existing one, knowing what your competitors are up to can save your business.”

– Tim Berry, Entrepreneur

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

HOW TO MAKE YOUR BRAND SHINE As you can see, your brand is at the core of a successful business. Your brand forms from the quality of products and services delivered to your customers, your interactions with its stakeholders and collaborators, your internal beliefs and values, even what employees feel about the business.

Think of your brand as a beacon among the noise.

When the light is dim, it becomes harder and harder for customers to find your light in a cluttered marketplace. When the light is strong, it clearly attracts customers to the value your brand offers.

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? Once you have identified and completed these first seven aspects of brand positioning, you’ll be able to move to the next four aspects, which will help you learn How to Get a Unique Brand Personality.

We’ll go into more detail in our next ebook!

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The Quest for a Great Brand Part 1: Brand Positioning

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