Branding for Organizations: 12 Checkpoints

 

A beginners guide to branding might just include all the details that are required to understand branding and how it works. But, for successful branding, it is important to understand the key topics that everyone should cover in order to have a consistent branding strategy. 

Checklist for Creating a Successful Branding Strategy

    ➤Audience - Understanding who is going to be buying or interacting with you is key to having a successful long-term branding strategy. Organizations today focus more on the image a customer has of them as compared to their overall image in the market.. Knowing your consumer is the base to forming a successful branding strategy to achieve the vision and mission of the company in the future.

    ➤Value Proposition - The value proposition of any organization is the added value that the organization gives to its customers along with the product and service that they are primarily offering. Value propositions can be the added benefits that a company provides that is meant to delight a customer and get them more involved with the company. The higher the value proposition of a company, the better.

➤ ➤Vision - The vision of a company is what it wants to achieve in the foreseeable future. The vision can be performance-based or expectation-based. When creating the branding strategy of a company, the vision of the company plays an important role in forming a strong base. Understanding how to move ahead, and developing an overall perception of the company is what the Vision is all about.

➤ ➤ Mission - Imaging setting a goal and not doing anything to achieve it. This is where the mission of an organization comes into play. The mission defines the steps or the short-term goals that the company is going to take in order to reach its long-term goal. For example, if a company is on a mission to be the number one trusted company in terms of pottery items then they are going to brand themselves in a way that this is going to be achievable.

      ➤ Passion - Branding is a display of the level of passion in a company. The more passionate you are about being an individual entity in the business of the world, the better the branding of the company is. It takes passion and commitment to correctly brand an organization and retain that branding for a long term. 

      ➤ Uniqueness - The greatest distinguishing factor of one company from another is its uniqueness. How are you different from the rest of the world? What are you offering to your customers that no one else has thought about? Your uniqueness is what is presented to the market. Branding your uniqueness is what sets you apart from everyone else.

      ➤ USPs - USPs or Unique Selling Proposition of a company is related to the products and the services that the company provides. For a company that is selling shoes, maybe the USP is the design and the weight of the shoe as compared to its immediate competitors. USPs are the reason why consumers buy a product and even distinguish one company from another. The more unique a product is, the more influence it has on the branding part for the company.

      ➤ Consistency - Branding is not a one-day activity. It takes years to form. Branding is all about the amount of effort and the repetition of these efforts. Consistency in terms of posting about the brand, forming and improving the image that the brand has, driving engagement through content and events, and getting your target audience to notice and to trust you is the best way to move forward for any brand. The more consistent efforts put in a brand, the better will be the output for the brand. 

     ➤  Logo - The biggest asset to a brand is the logo. It is the graphic definition of a brand that is going to be a permanent ID card for the brand in front of customers and even competitors in the same field. Logos are important to be associated with the brand and to be able to bring out the reason for the brand’s existence. Branding can go a long way, as such, even logos today are referred to by the brand instead of mentioning the name of the brand. 

      ➤ Slogans - Slogans or taglines are an integrated way of recognising a brand. The slogan is what defines the motive, objective, and the vision of the brand. Slogans are as notorious as a logo is in the long run. Having a slogan or a tagline that works to communicate what the brand is all about is the best way to form a brand identity that is remembered by all.

      ➤ Color Combination - Colors are at the core of an effective brand strategy. Colors are psychological and affect the way things are perceived by the consumer. Color theory and the relation of color with the human mind is an effective way to bring out the branding of a company. A great deal of thought and discussion always goes into the color selection of a company. Coloring subconsciously is what drives brands into the minds of its customers and competition and helps enhance its uniqueness.

      ➤ Product Branding - How are you communicating what you are going to be selling to customers? The communication that is attached to every single product or service collectively arranged together forms the basis of the overall branding of the company. New products require thorough thought to market it properly to the right consumer. Product branding goes a long way for the reputation of the company

Branding is something that drives the image of a company deep into the minds of potential customers, competitors, and the field that it is catering to. Since branding is the way of a company to build its image and constitutes of a variety of factors including graphical representation, product branding, communication to potential customers, and more which are a bubble to the overall picture of the total branding that goes towards the making of a company.