A listener, Irene Beard, is starting her own company. She's always believed in a strong brand, but how can she plan what people take away from her brand? Since we discussed this on a recent podcast, and I thought many of you might have the same problem, I thought I would also share our insight on this topic here.
Before we get into that, I thought I would mention that Beard contacted us as part of our "I'm in a pickle!" feature, where listeners write or call us regarding a business problem they want our advice to solve. If you have a topic you would like to discuss with us, don't hesitate to get in touch with us here.
The excellent news for Irene is that she is already on the right path. She thinks of brands appropriately, and not everyone does. Brands are a tactic we use, which is different than strategy.
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A company needs a few things before they have a brand. For example, there should be a goal for the value you deliver to customers. Having that goal requires choosing your target customer and positioning your offer, determining the value it provides. These are examples of things that need to come first. Otherwise, you risk having a brand with a clever name and a fantastic logo and not much else.
Your brand is a tactic. It's a way of creating and communicating value to your customers. In other words, it's just a tool. So, if we make our brand independent of our strategy, we leave a significant tool in the toolkit instead of using it to deliver value.
History of Branding
The first brand began with an English tea company. They began marking their product so people knew where the tea came from. This instance of "branding" was a first in product development.
In the early days of branding, companies would mark a product to indicate that it came from them, like how ranchers do with cattle. Later, the concept of a brand developed to serve as provenance, signaling a level of quality and where to go if something was wrong.
Brands today have evolved even further. The brand's reputation and consistent quality create value over and above the product. This approach is beneficial if the competitive field is relatively constant on the product side. Having a better brand might provide value to customers.
The Branded Boot
Years ago, when my son was young and playing community soccer, he wanted the soccer boots (or cleats for those of you that call football soccer) David Beckham wore, the Addidas Predators. As you can imagine, these boots were expensive. As my son was around ten then, I was reluctant to spend a ton on soccer shoes that were unlikely to see the same action on the pitch that Beckham's did.
I reasoned with my son that these boots would not make him a better player. However, he persisted, as ten-year-olds will.
Eventually, I realized that the thing these boots would do, besides draining my bank account, was make him feel more confident. I reasoned that feeling more confident would lead to him playing more confidently. So, I bought them.
In this example, the brand's reputation, that the boots were good enough for Beckham, felt like it could change my son's self-identity into a more confident football player. This evolution of brand from identifier to provenance to reputation and value has led to four value areas for brands.