Question

Topic: Branding

What Is The Secret To Branding?

Posted by Anonymous on 10/17/2005 at 9:17 PM ET 250 Points
My company has been around for 125 years. It use to be a dairy, but now we are expanding our product line to include produce, meats and specialty items and want to better brand our name. Starbucks did it. I know I am impressed with the name recognition and I don't even drink coffee! What are the steps to changing the perception of our potential consumers to make it our new reality? Thanks. Rex at Winder Farms.
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by wnelson on 10/17/2005 at 9:36 PM Accepted
    Branding starts with understanding the marketing and customers, your competitors, and your company's unique selling points. Here's an outline of the process:

    Market and Customers
    • Who are the customers?

    • How can you group them according to their needs (rank these “segments” from largest to smallest)?

    • What are their needs?

    • What are their influencers and motivators?

    • To which media do they subscribe?

    • What messages and forms of messages are they prone to be drawn to? This is KEY

    Competition
    • Who are the competitors?

    • What are they strengths and weaknesses?

    • How well do they satisfy the customers’ needs (by segment)?

    Your Company
    • What are the company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT)?

    • What are the core competencies of the company? i.e. What can the firm do best?

    • How can the company use its core competencies to:
      • take advantage of its strengths to exploit the competitions’ weaknesses

      • make its weaknesses into strengths

      • take advantage of opportunities

      • avoid threats

    • How can the firm leverage theses core competencies to satisfy the needs of the customers?

    Branding
    • Create a position statement. The position statement is a part of the strategy and communicates to those inside the company the any and all of the following:
      • Placement within a market segment
      • Placement of the product relative to other products categories and application
      • Placement versus competitors' products
      • Placement of the product in terms of features and benefits

      The position statement is critical to have in place before the marketing "production" work is completed because it ties everything together.

    • Complete the branding plan
      • Name

      • Logo

      • Product characteristics - colors, features, quality

      • packaging and packaging characteristics (colors, font styling, logo and logo placement)

      • tag lines

    Media Plan
    Set up a plan with who/what/when details for each of the following to
    • Internal communications

      • Management meetings (especially for the rollout)

      • Banners

      • Give-aways

      • teeshirts

    • Press releases

    • Trade magazine articles

    • Advertising

    • Brochures

    • Application notes/white papers

    • Webpages

    • eMail/eZines

    • Direct mail

    One of the major keys to successful branding is consistency. Consistent use of the name, colors, packaging, quality levels, etc. You will notice this about Starbucks.

    I hope this helps.

    Wayde
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