Brand Building Process: 5 Stages to Business Success

A recognizable and beloved brand is a business’s most valuable asset. Brand building helps businesses overcome competitors and build customer loyalty. To do this, businesses must have a solid brand building process.

In this article, we will go through the 5 stages of a successful branding process (according to Lee Frederiksen).

5 basic stages of a branding process

The brand building process consists of 5 stages. Together we will explore each stage in detail and the important factors to create success.

1. Stage 1: Brand strategy

Behind the success of every brand is a comprehensive strategy. Keeping up with this stage is essential and important for the overall success of the brand.

1.1 Internal business assessment

Businesses will start by reviewing the overall business strategy, goals, market strategy and the personal views of the management team. At this point, we will have disagreements.

This is also the time for businesses to review their business plans, do they need to make any adjustments to their marketing activities?

With different perspectives, businesses need to consider, select and combine to build an effective strategy.

1.2 Identify the target audience

Next, businesses must identify the audiences they want to target. There are many ways to approach the target audience such as: Market research, customer surveys, social networks, competitors, etc. From there, businesses will target the audience according to the following aspects:

• Age
• Gender
• Income
• Geography

Target The target audience of a business is not just customers, the target audience is those who have an impact on the success of the business. These can be: Partners, influencers, referral sources and potential employees.

1.3 Research the audience

After identifying the target audience, the next step is to research the audience to have the most objective view of their needs, challenges and motivations. Below are the issues that businesses need to pay attention to:

• What issues do they prioritize?
• Do they know your business exists?
• How they feel about your business
• Who they consider your competitors
• How strong do they consider your business’s reputation?
• What they see as your business’s strengths
• What they see as your business’s weaknesses or vulnerabilities
• If they were customers, why would they choose your product/service

To answer these questions, businesses must conduct research and interview the target audience. The results will help businesses build a strong bridge to connect their businesses and their audiences.

1.4 Identify the differences between your business and your competitors

Next, you must identify the differences to differentiate your business from your competitors competitors. The differences you find must meet three criteria:

• Be real
• Be relevant to your target audience
• Be proven

You should not choose common and general features. For example: “Our staff is highly qualified and competent”, “We have a proprietary process” or “We have the most attentive and dedicated customer service”. These are all characteristics that can be found in any business. If not, you must present convincing evidence to prove these differences.

1.5 Write a positioning statement

A positioning statement is a concise statement of the position that a business wants its product or brand to achieve in the minds of customers. The positioning statement must demonstrate two points: Your business’s current position in the market and the aspiration, the position that your business wants to achieve.

People often confuse a positioning statement with a mission statement or a vision statement. In essence, a positioning statement is just a paragraph of about 4-6 sentences, which serves as the basis for the message that the business wants to convey. This is a resource that distills the quintessence of the brand into an easy-to-understand paragraph.

1.6 Adjust the message to suit different audiences

In this step, you can apply the differentiation and positioning identified above to each audience. You should divide the audiences and personalize the messages for each audience. The messages must have what customers need to hear to feel secure in choosing to experience your products/services.

1.7 Handle complex branding situations

During the development process, businesses will encounter situations such as: Establishing new business divisions, subsidiary products, independent products or sub-brands that do not have a clear connection to the parent brand. This requires businesses to take the time to clearly establish the hierarchy and relationships between brands. It helps customers better understand your business, about the diverse services, eliminates confusion, and makes the purchasing process easier. This solution is called Brand Architecture.

2. Phase 2: Brand recognition

In this phase, businesses will make their brand visible. Brand identity is a collection of the most recognizable elements of a brand, including:

• Brand name
• Logo
• Tagline
• Color palette
• Images
• Writing Style
• Brand Voice
• Business Cards
• Office Supplies
• Brand Identity Marketing

This is part of the branding process, businesses can develop some or all of the elements. A brand identity is what positions a business, what people can see or experience, and what visually differentiates your business from your competitors.

2.1 Brand Style and Voice Guidelines

Keeping a brand identity intact and consistent over time is a big challenge. To solve this problem, businesses must develop brand style guidelines that contain all the necessary information, ways to create a brand, explaining what is allowed and what is not.

In addition, some businesses develop guidelines that describe their brand voice. Brand voice is how a brand expresses its personality and guides consumers’ attitudes towards the brand. Businesses use Brand Voice Guidelines to ensure that written materials are consistent and consumers can recognize them as coming from the same brand.

2.2 Creative Brief

Before diving into building a brand identity, businesses should write a Creative Brief that presents the necessary information in a concise way to ensure branding is on the right track.

The Creative Brief should address each element of the brand identity, which means that for each element of the identity you should develop a separate brief. For example, if your business is developing a new Brand Name, the Brief should clearly state your business’s expectations and the issues to avoid so as not to go “wrong” or into a “dead end”.

3. Phase 3: Branding tools

These are necessary tools for businesses to promote their brands. Based on the brand strategy, these tools will help businesses spread their brand. Which tools a business needs will depend on how it wants to position itself for brand visibility. Here are the two most important tools that every business should have.

3.1 Website

Whether a business wants to design a new website or upgrade its current one to make it more appealing, it must ensure that it reflects its brand positioning and conveys the right message to its audience. The website must also be consistent with the brand identity.

Businesses should focus on investing in their websites, as they are the most visible and important part of their brand and marketing program.

3.2 Business Development Toolkit

One of the most important ways to drive new business is to implement all of your new positioning and messaging into your business development toolkit.

What is a business development toolkit? It is a collection of tools that businesses use to describe their business and put their strategy into action. For example:

• Description of your company
• Description of services
• Video overview of your company
• Signage
• Exhibition booth

4. Phase 4: Launching the Brand

How a business introduces its brand can influence the overall success of its branding. The two audiences that businesses must pay attention to when introducing their brand are: Internal businesses and the Public.

4.1 Internal brand launch

Explaining the new brand internally to the business is necessary. Without a clear explanation of how and why brand decisions are made, employees will be confused and skeptical.

Therefore, businesses must implement an employee “education” program before introducing it to the outside world. It can be a simple meeting or a grand celebration, it can be a single event or a series of training sessions, it can be at a single location or in separate departments. Explain the reasons for the change and the research to prove that the branding process is completely objective. Employees also need to understand what the new brand means, how it repositions your business, and what new opportunities it opens up.

4.2 Launching your brand to the public

The greatest value of launching your brand to the public is creating attention in a short time. This is an opportunity for businesses to easily make an impression on consumers. It helps businesses understand how your company is changing and why your company is important to the public.

There are two ways for you to announce your brand: 1) press release, brand introduction video,… 2) introduce slowly, without fanfare.

The first way will bring a lot of PR potential but requires businesses to build their brand in advance. The second way allows businesses to freely develop their brand naturally and with less pressure.

5. Stage 5: Building a long-term brand

Branding is just the beginning, you have to turn the brand into market value. Many businesses make the mistake of focusing all their efforts on a brand launch without a long-term branding campaign. The core goal of this strategy is to make your business’s expertise more visible to customers.

The strategy requires persistence, and a combination of digital and traditional platforms. Businesses turn it into a complete plan, with detailed tasks, timelines, and specific goals. Proceed to monitor, measure aspects of the strategy, and make adjustments during implementation.

Branding is a long-term strategy that increases competitiveness, creates lasting customer loyalty, and opens up new opportunities for business growth. The above specific step-by-step strategy building process will help you feel confident and ready to achieve success with your brand. If you have any questions that need support when building your brand, please contact Adsmo for the best advice.

See more:

• How to build a brand
• Brand building model