4. Your brand is most likely the number one driver behind your
business operations, successes, and failures; which is why it’s of the
utmost importance to ensure your brand is aligned with your
business and marketing strategies. Here’s the thing—businesses
aren’t static. We get it. As your business has changed, it’s likely your
brand has needed to evolve as well. If your logo looks like it was
designed in Microsoft Paint and you have a decade-old website
that’s in flash, you’re probably cued up for some
strategic rebranding.
5. Taking time to conduct some primary
research with your target markets will
provide your brand with some guiding
points—we pinky promise.
Crissy Saint, Sr. Communications Strategist
7. You’re probably a pro at doing what you do best—from handling the
ins and outs of the daily grind to putting out fires as they arise (and
they always do). By conducting a brand audit, you’re able to check
the pulse on your brand to discover areas of improvement and
opportunities for momentous growth. Bringing in external, objective
brand strategists can help your team gain internal consensus
to move ahead.
8. Ever told a white lie in front of your boss because you
weren’t sure how they’d take it? Conducting anonymous
interviews and surveys can help the internal stakeholders
of an organization speak with candor about the various
challenges and opportunities they feel exist. By gathering
and reviewing this type of insight, everyone can come to-
gether and gain consensus on how best to move the brand
forward.
Taking time to conduct some primary research with your
target markets will provide your brand with some guiding
points—we pinky promise. Go straight to the source (your
consumers) and they’ll tell you what’s not working and
what is. Whether it’s your messaging or your pricing mod-
el, your target audience will practically spell out for you
where you’re hitting the mark and where you’re dropping
the ball.
Where you’re going is (in-part) shaped by where you’ve
been, especially as a brand out and about in the public
eye. A brand workshop where you review past iterations
of your brand, your brand assets, and your strategy can
be extremely telling. What was the original vision of the
brand—and how has that evolved over time? Hindsight is
20/20.
GET THE INSIDE SCOOP
MARKET RESEARCH ALWAYS
HELPS
TAKE A GLANCE BACKWARDS
10. As Drake rapped, “[we] started from the bottom, now we’re here.”
It’s likely that when your brand took its first steps that the context
in which it was born made perfect sense. Over time the landscape
tends to change, which could leave you high and dry with brand
positioning that doesn’t quite make sense anymore. That market
research we talked about during the brand audit phase? That’s
where this comes into play. Take a look at your competitors and
map out a sweet spot for your brand that allows you speak your
tribe’s lingo while differentiating yourself from the crowd.
11. By analyzing your brand’s following, you’re able to
segment your audience based on certain criteria that
will help you form personas of your primary target
audience type. These personas, or consumer profiles,
can help you define how to best position your brand so
it’s consistently relevant to those you’re targeting.
Sponge up everything you can possibly uncover about
your competitors. What are they doing that’s next
level? How are they interacting with their audiences?
What is the look-and-feel they’re building brand
equity with? Which platforms do they market on? What
are their differentiators? Knowing the players will help
you win the game.
Remember that time when you got caught doing
something you weren’t supposed to and your mom
wasn’t even in the same room? How was that
possible? Consumers, much like your parentals, have a
sixth sense about when something’s amiss. Your brand
should be positioned on that which is tried and true for
your culture, your vision, and your values. No one ever
supports a poser. Lesson? Be yourself.
WHO IS MY TARGET AUDIENCE
WHAT ARE MY COMPETITORS
UP TO?
IS MY BRAND BEING AUTHENTIC?
13. A few years back, Steve McKee published “When Growth Stalls”
in which he states that of nearly 5,700 companies that he
studied—41.2% of them had stalled in the previous decade.
Why? Brands (and their humans) came across a challenge and
didn’t adapt. That makes sense in a way because change can be
scary—but it doesn’t have to be.
14. Think five steps ahead and start to map out how your
brand refresh will make it’s way into the public sphere.
A Project Manager can be super handy in times like
these and can help identify certain times in your
industry that might be more conducive to and/or hinder
the release of your evolved brand. Take that into
account and plan accordingly.
If you’re a larger organization that’s been around for
a handful of decades—it’s likely your current brand is
smattered about all over the place. In fact, we can
almost bet that there are pieces of marketing collateral
circulating that you forgot even existed. Appoint
someone (or various people) the task of putting
together a Brand Asset List that will help you identify all
the materials that will need to be swapped out with the
newly-branded materials come go time.
Once you’ve figured out why your brand has been
successful thus far—take note of the reasons why and
don’t try to change just for the sake of change. The main
goal here is forward progress, but that doesn’t mean
that there aren’t aspects of your brand that your
audience isn’t absolutely in love with. There’s nothing
worse than rolling out an evolved brand that leaves your
partners, clients, and consumers heading for the hills.
PLAN YOUR NEW BRAND
ROLL OUT
TAKE INVENTORY
DON’T TRY AND FIX WHAT
ISN’T BROKEN
15. Connect With MM Brand Agency For
Additional Insight On The Market
Research Process
MMBRANDAGENCY.COM HELLO@MMBRANDAGENCY.COM TEL 917 626 8270
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