Whiplash Team, 3rd March 2023
Seven tips for building a successful brand
Building a successful brand is not an easy task. However, there are some tips that must be kept in mind when building and enhancing the value of the brand.
Making a brand grow, positioning it and gaining the trust of users implies not only having a defined purpose. It is necessary to generate strategies and tactics that allow for the proper evolution of the brand, as well as aligning the organization internally so that the desired results occur.
However, there are some key tips that can help make the task easier:
1. Understand our market
Brands must be specific. That is to say, we cannot declare that our brand is in the catering business or fast food or hamburgers sector.
These are all generic categories, not markets. A market is defined as being a specific group of consumers with a specific need in a specific context.
Always remember that brands hold the promise of a relevant differentiated experience. Thus, the brand will be in the business of offering an exceptional, relevant, differentiated and consistent gastronomic experience, for a specific group of potential customers, over and over again.
2. Avoid generalities
Expanding on the above, offering generic category benefits makes the brand become a commodity without relevant differentiators. When a brand stands for everything, it stands for nothing special.
Patagonia, for example, does not make outdoor clothing, but rather positions itself as a brand that inspires and implements innovative solutions to the current environmental crisis.
3. Promise and deliver
For the brand to offer a basic promise this implies knowing very well what type of brand experience it intends to offer. A brand promise describes what you want to represent in the minds of a specific group of users and summarizes the brand’s commitment to its customers. Steadily and consistently delivering on the brand promise ensures that the brand will be relevant and distinctive to your target audience.
4. Focus on customer
The client must be at the centre of all the actions of the brand. Asking customers what they want is not productive, since we will receive general answers from them. However, the best way to innovate and renew the brand’s offer is by asking customers directly about the issues or concerns they have with the general category to which the brand belongs, or with the brand’s specific product or service.
5. Empower the brand
Strong brands make money. The goal of any brand should be the highest quality and most trusted source for a relevant and differentiated experience. Apple, for example, is always at the top of the list of the most powerful brands. This brand power makes Apple perceived as a benchmark for quality, leadership, innovation and trust.
6. Implement a consistent brand architecture
The brand architecture establishes how brands within a portfolio interact. Without a coherent brand architecture, portfolio brands cannibalize rather than compete with external brands. There are four types of brand architecture:
- Model of independent brands (house of brands). In this model, different independent brands coexist for different lines of business.
- Monolithic model (branded house). This model uses a single brand at the corporate and commercial level in all products, services and lines of business.
- Brand support model (endorsed brand). Here the corporate brand and product or company brands are combined. The corporate brand explicitly supports the product or group companies.
- Mixed model (hybrid). This model combines different brand architecture models for different lines of business.
7. Be consistent
Clients want consistency. Inconsistent brand behaviour erodes user trust. If a brand is erratic in its messages, if there is no consistency between what it says and what it does, or if it behaves opportunistically when faced with society’s demands, it will lose customer loyalty.
