Branding Process

Out of context: Reply #20

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  • fate7

    Branding is not a logo, it's not "corporate guidelines" or creating an identity system, it's not "stylescapes" or "moodboards"

    No company worth a shit starts with these things as part of a branding process.

    Yes, these things help support a brand. But so do a million other things, like how a cashier greets you, or how you price your product. Has far more to do with creating a culture at a company (words, images, beliefs, values, norms, actions)

    If you're looking for questions:

    1. Customer Analysis

    Start with the customer in mind. Who are they? Age, ethnicity, education, spending habits? Brands they like? Back this up with more than assumptions. Do surveys and interviews if you can. Just because your client THINKS they know their customer, doesn't mean they really know. How many customers for an idea/product like this are really out there? What media do they consume? What social platforms are they on? What's the best way to reach them? What do they value?

    2. Competitive Analysis

    Now you need to do a competitive analysis. Do a survey of who else is out there doing similar things. Where are they succeeding? Where are they missing the mark? What should you emulate, and where should you innovate? This is helpful for you to just get your head in the game and understand their business and where they're coming from. Starts to give you an idea of how things might be done. Try to discover both direct and indirect competitors.

    3. Positioning Statement

    So once you know your customer and your competitors, you can stake out a position. Positioning is going to inform everything else. You know who the competitors are and what they're doing, so how are you going to respond? How will our product be different? Where will we provide value? Why would anyone give a shit about us? These questions will help inform what it is we're actually creating, both on the creative/production side but most importantly on the business side.

    4. SWOT Analysis

    With all this shit in mind, your client should do a SWOT analysis.

    5. Marketing Plan

    Ideally, all this culminates in a marketing plan that has all of the above info. It should define the Product, Price, Place (distribution) and Promotion. Plus specifics like forecasting revenues and P/L, Break Even analysis, Year 1, 2, 3 goals, KPI's, and recommended marketing activities. The marketing plan is going to help define the product itself, how we plan to support it and make it successful, and how to get there.

    This is what a brand is born from. A brand is how you express your position in the market, what you stand for, and helps support a marketing plan.

    Not a fucking logo, or a PDF of do's and don'ts.

    fate 7Permalink
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    • Thanks, but got the process, looking for a simple list of questions to hand to a clientformed
    • just want to see if there's anything I am missing w our current listformed
    • Sorry, my reaction was not to you, but more re: how this thread accumulated bad advice over the years.fate
    • Marketing strategy should be replaced with brand strategy. Marketing strategy is totally separate.Hayoth
    • Yes, that’s fine and we’ll and all but how about the mom and pop diner down the street, should they be told to fuck off because they can’t afford the full_niko
    • ...Branding process? They have $800 to spend, what does this get them? Seriously what the fuck is a swot?_niko
    • Your brand is how people perceive you. No more, no less. Everything else is masturbatory bullshit._niko
    • "what the fuck is a SWOT" lolHayoth
    • We've done these processes for Mom and Pop. Set what we price u wantHayoth
    • Yeah, and how they perceive you comes down to product, price, place, promotion. How you going to shape perception without understanding the market?fate
    • Design without insight and strategy = masturbatory bullshitfate
    • The "branding" for a mom and pop diner down the street has WAY more to do with how the server treats me and how good the food is, not some bullshit logo.fate
    • How cool is the diner's decor? How expensive is the food? How easy is parking? What's the history of the place? WAY more important than some stupid logo.fate
    • It's not my fault you've never heard of a SWOT in your career, nor worked at the level to consider how to actually make a business successful.fate
    • Hayoth knows what's up.fate
    • You forgot about stakeholder interviews, the 4cs, Tone & Voice, etc. Those things all influence the output for branding.shellie
    • So many of our clients are afraid of the SWOT, makes me laugh. "WHERE ARE OUR BRAND GUIDELINES GODDAMMIT?"ben_
    • fate I agree with your points completely, don't get me wrong, but a proper process requires a huge budget, sometimes all they need or want is a stupid logo._niko
    • and you can't fake a brand. You can't come close to what a diner's built up for 20 years organically with some bullshit branding process._niko
    • take Philip Morris. Did their $100 million rebrand to Altria, complete with SWOT analysis up the ass do anything for their brand? hell no lol_niko
    • also i hate processes. Sterile, repetitive, boring. no sex, no art. Is branding a creative endeavour or a clinical one?_niko
    • it's like a musician. I can name you a hundred artists that were created via this process. They check off all the boxes and sell millions of records._niko
    • Everything from their name to their look to their sound to their lyrics has been created by following a process of what works and what sells. But it's utter..._niko
    • shit, we can all agree on that. The best artists much like the best brands come from something else. Something innate, something honest, something instinctual_niko
    • This framework is a tool, how you use it is up to you. Your example of musicians is good, you can take talentless hacks and still be successful with thiszarkonite
    • process. The real art comes in when you have talent + process combine to make something bigger. As a professional, your job is to get results for your clientszarkonite
    • and this is a way of ensuring that. Otherwise it's just gambling, and wasting your clients' money is a great way of destroying your own brand.zarkonite
    • _niko, I've found that the best projects I've ever worked on started with trying to shore up or reimagine their actual business.fate
    • We've all stepped foot in a place and thought "It doesn't matter what logo I design, this place is fucked if it doesn't make massive changes and reinvent itselffate
    • Also, any good Creative Brief is going to capture these things (audience, competition, brand positioning, marketing strategy and goals)fate
    • Branding as a concept is idiotic due to the very lack of accessible utility it exemplifies in this thread.cannonball1978
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