Cutting through the clutter and creating relevance for your brand

In the market brands live in today, it is increasingly difficult to become noticed in a world where consumers are continually bombarded with advertising and a plethora of competing organisations who are buying for business. Traditional advertising combined with the ever expanding digital marketing opportunities, has made it more difficult to cut through the clutter to reach audiences.

For consumers, choices are overwhelming and it is becoming a greater challenge to distinguish between the features and benefits of brands to make buying choices based on comparison alone. Audiences begin to look at different avenues to decide on the right product or service for their needs, and choices are often made based on culture and values, with less focus on price and features.

To ensure marketing drives the best traction with consumers, brands need to be focused with a clear and succinct offering, and more importantly, an offering that is clearly unique from the competition. So how can brands become more powerful in the marketplace, and more meaningful to customers with so much choice?

Brand Strategy

Brands are only as good as the intelligence behind them

A brand strategy helps to find a brand’s – in the words of Austin Powers – “Mojo”. It helps us to understand a brand’s uniqueness in a marketplace of similarities and comparables. Through a considered and strategic approach we can define the answers to questions that make brands different. 

•  What do we do that is different? 

•  How do we do it that is meaningful to our customers?

•  Who are our customers?

•  Where does our brand live?

•  Why does our brand matter to our customers?

The answer to these questions guide a brand to find its unique point of difference in a market full of clutter. It defines what a brand is and helps to create clarity in a world full of noise. 

Branding

Designing a brand’s uniqueness

Once we understand a brand’s mojo, it’s uniqueness, and why it matters to customers, it’s time to tell the world about it. As important as it is to understand what a brand stands for and why it’s different, if it is communicated in the same was as it’s competitors, than the value of the strategy means nothing.

The main purpose of branding is to get more people to buy more stuff for more years at a higher price. A brand’s visual treatment, messaging and meaning needs to be visually succinct, speaking in a language that connects with consumers. When implemented correctly, a brand’s visual representation can generate desire, provoke reaction and inspire audiences.

The connection between a brand strategy and the brand design is important. It is the bridge between analytical thinking and creative implementation, and when done right can create powerful connections with audiences. Gone are the day of design for the sake of pretty pictures, without the strategy mixed with creative execution a brand simply lacks substance.

Brand Delivery

Delivering an outcome that adds value to a business

If the questions above have been answered with conviction and certainty then delivering a brand to market becomes a lot easier. We understand who our customers are, where we are communicating our brand and with what message that makes us unique. However, all brand communications need to succinctly work together, and be designed to deliver an outcome that adds value to a business.

It is about creating an engagement funnel that touches our customers at the right place, at the right time, and that leads them to a position to make a buying choice in favor of our brand. Understanding and defining communication channels is one thing, but delivering them to market in a strategic way simply capitalises on our investment.

In the fast pasted world we live in today, technology and social behaviors change just as quickly. To maintain a brand’s relevance and uniqueness we continually need to analyze our brands positioning and performance.

Understanding a brand’s effectiveness in the marketplace is also important to make adjustments and stay connected with what our customers think. It keeps a brand relevant and focused to drive long term relationships. As with people, a brand’s uniqueness can be altered with evolving environmental and economic changes.

In conclusion

By adding more focus to a brand through strategy, bridging the gap between business thinking and creative implementation through focused messaging and design, and staying present with your brands relevance in the marketplace, the investments we make in marketing drive far greater outcomes for our business.

“The main purpose of branding is to get more people to buy more stuff for more years at a higher price” – Marty Neumeier.

Want to find out more? Check out these great projects where we have created and implemented a full branding project with our clients – Sonny the Sustainability Scout and Enfield Aquatic Centre, or contact us to discuss your branding strategy!

Scott Beatty

C7EVEN Communications – Senior Designer