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THE BISCUIT TEST
If your brand were a biscuit, what kind of biscuit would it be? Does that seem like a silly question? Or perhaps you have tried it before and found that it works. Often your customers and your staff find it difficult to think of words to encapsulate what your brand stands for. But they might be able to identify your brand as Chocolate Hobnob, completely different from your competitor’s brand, which they see as Custard Cream. Using metaphors can help people define brand identity. People generally find it a lot easier to make comparisons than define concepts. So they can easily identify one brand as a Chocolate Hobnob, and another as a Custard Cream.
The idea When your brand message doesn’t seem to be making it through to your own staff or to your customers, one way to investigate this is to help people describe the way they see your brand. Often, the directors will have one vision of the brand, while the staff have a completely different idea. Customers will have their own ideas. The biscuit test is a way to compare the differences. You can do the same exercise, asking what car would be closest to your brand, or which magazine, or dog. It can be a really helpful way to shed light on the differences between people’s perceptions. Once you’ve
178 • 100 GREAT BRANDING IDEAS
100 Great Branding Ideas 14dec.indd 178
12/14/11 11:14 AM
